

### The Amazon Chronicle

### Book I

### \- Taysha -

### Lost Daughter of the Amazoi

First Revision

© Brad Foubister 2013

All rights reserved

First Revision printed Nov. 2013

This book is a work of fiction.

Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.

Any resemblance to actual persons or events is purely coincidental.

Edited:

Sally Jennings

Printed:

E-book

Cover:

Studio-Era.com

Osfer (the language of the Amazoi) and the Amazoi Tribal Symbol are copyright Brad Foubister 1983, 2013

Dedicated

To

Whom the Story Speaks

PREFACE

In 1946, in the wake of the Nazi destruction, the Great Soviet Union set its energies on rebuilding its war-torn nation. During this time a young engineer named Nicolai Stranskov was tasked with the reconstruction of Anapa, a small city with a long history on the northeast coast of the Black Sea. While digging out a foundation under a devastated Greek Orthodox Church, workers uncovered seven large clay pots weighing several kilograms each. The wide-mouthed jars were sealed with a tar-like substance that had become brittle with age. In the hope that they held treasure, the workmen opened the jars before Stranskov's arrival only to find they contained 24 tightly wound scrolls of papyrus-like material.

Recognising the importance of the discovery, Nicolai chose to entrust this newfound historic treasure to the Party and surrendered them to the authorities based in Sevastopol. They were in turn handed over to the Moscow State University where they sat untouched for the next eleven years, waiting to be translated and documented.

In 1957, Alexandar Orlov, the new university curator, took control of the huge stockpile of artifacts yet to be archived. Having been a teacher of ancient Greek studies and language at the Irkutsk State Institute of Foreign Languages, he held a special interest in the pots and the scrolls inside them. He had recognized the jars to be of Greek design and thought them possibly from the ancient Greek colony of Gorgippia.

He quietly gathered information from his friends and specialists in the academic field on the handling and storage of ancient documentation. Then with the great amount of spare time his new position provided, he endeavoured to learn the mystery of the scrolls.
Undisturbed, he spent the next 33 years of his life translating the pages from ancient Greek while researching the local tribes, languages and history of the Caucasus Mountains.

In the confusion following the dismantling of the Soviet Union in 1991 and with the help of an unknown friend, Alexandar Orlov transported the scrolls to his apartment on the outskirts of Moscow. Upon his death in 2005, his unfinished books were found along with a room full of linguistic charts, books of historical documentation on the tribes and settlements along the Caucasus.

Using descriptions found in the scrolls, Orlov had created detailed maps of the locations and routes he estimated to be the paths taken by the people described in the scrolls.

His manuscript covers had the handwritten title of "The Ama-zoi. Were they the Amazons of Greek Myth?" that recount the history of a tribe over a span of five generations.

(The location of the original Greek Church and the whereabouts of the scrolls are presently unknown.)

The title _"Taysha: The Lost Daughter of the Amazoi"_ was taken from Professor Orlov's notes found among his papers after his death in 2005.

*More information can be found at the end of this book.

Taysha  
\--Lost Daughter of the Amazoi--

These stories were told to me by my mother as were told to her by her mother, and so on and so forth through countless days.

The paths chosen by those who have lived and died by fortune's fickle ways are re-told to you to help direct your choices in the hope that you will not sway and flutter, wafted by the mischief of the gods like a mindless leaf in the wind.

These stories are of us all.
In the morning of an early winter day long ago, Taysha and her mother were checking the fish traps at the river when the screaming started. Out of sight beyond the dense line of trees they could hear the shrill voices of panicked women mixed with the barking dogs and the guttural yells of the men. The sounds echoed from the mountainside behind them, adding to the confusion, but they could tell the cries were coming from their village. People were calling out to family members and signalling out points of assembly against the unseen danger.

Despite her fur cloak and winter tunic, Taysha felt a sudden stabbing cold engulf her entire being. She was breathing hard and trying to listen as she stood not knowing whether she wanted to run toward the sounds or run away. She looked at her mother for answers and could instantly tell she didn't know what to do either. Taysha's thoughts seemed to carry her countless mountains away as she tried not to think of what might be happening. The empty feeling in her stomach told her something terrible was coming toward them and she looked up at her mother again. She could not help thinking it was such a waste for her mother at 28 Winters and herself at the beginning of her 14th, to die so young. Taysha knew they would not be the only ones.

She had reached child-bearing age last summer and her parents and the elders had chosen the husband she would marry the coming spring. Her thoughts went to the marriage ceremony she would not be having and to the young man who was supposed to be her partner until the end of this life. That young man was somewhere where all the yelling was coming from.

Taysha looked in the direction of the village, hoping to see him running toward the river but neither he nor her father or brother nor anyone else came. Her head started swimming and her stomach ached. She looked at her fingers that had become cold and numb from the river water when her mother's hand flashed out and grabbed Taysha by her wrist.

"Come!" she commanded as she started to run towards the village. Taysha looked down to keep from stumbling on the smooth river rocks but they did not get far. Her mother suddenly stopped before she could finish her third step.

As Taysha looked up, she saw them.
In an instant her eyes captured all their details as if they had been carved in stone. Three men, painted, wild, and horrific had appeared out of the bushes about two stonethrows away. Their brown hair and beards were either dyed a reddish-brown or coated in mud. Their faces were covered in the yellow paint of war. On their left arms they held small, round wooden shields with the markings of their tribe. All three had short, wide swords. Their thick leather armour was stained with sweat as they stood steaming and panting for breath.

They had appeared just to the right of the shortest distance between the women and their village. Taysha could feel her mother's hesitancy as she lightly pulled Taysha's hand as if she were going to run, then rocked back on her heels in second thought. It was obvious they would never make it past the men.

Taysha's eyes kept darting from one to the other, trying to assess the situation. But it made little sense to her. The smiles on their faces were what confused Taysha the most.

'How can they pretend to be so happy?'

The senselessness of her situation knotted her fluttering stomach. She was angry with them for their obvious joy at creating such turmoil in her village. The idea was beyond her understanding. They reminded her of Rafelti, that stupid boy who took pleasure in kicking down the play-hut Taysha and her friends made summers ago.

Taysha's scattered thoughts seemed to drop out of her head as the men started to walk casually towards her and her mother. Taysha began to feel dizzy, then suddenly became strangely confident. Her reasoning had told her the only explanation for why three armed men would be walking in their direction: there were men from her village behind her.

" _Of course,"_ she thought. _"Some of our men must have been out hunting and came back when they heard the noise from camp. They must be standing right behind us now. Right across the river."_

A nervous smile crept across her lips as she dared looked directly into the eyes of the closest man to her left. Only then did she realize he was not looking behind her but at her, and he was smiling back.

Taysha started to turn around to look across the river; as if doing so would make her imagined rescuers real.
Before she could, her mother grabbed her shoulders and pulled her close to her face. She touched Taysha's forehead to her own and with eyes shut tightly, said quietly and quickly, "You must run or you will die. This is not my wish but it must be done." She opened her eyes and looked deep into Taysha's.

"Go!" she whispered forcefully.

With that, her mother pulled Taysha's body sideways by the shoulder of her bear fur cloak. She released her grip and turned towards the men. Taysha stumbled sideways a step or two and stood with her mouth open, waiting for some words of response to come out. Her mother snapped her head back towards her.

"Go!" she screamed with a grimace that horrified Taysha. It brought a new darkened fear to the depths of her soul. In shock, she stepped back but steadied herself once again in an attempt to understand. At the sight of her hesitation her mother swiftly bent down and picked up two large stones, holding one up high over her head facing Taysha.

"I will kill you myself! I will not let them have you!" she screamed. Her eyes were opened wide and she bared her teeth as she snarled, "Go!"

It was the last word Taysha ever heard from her mother. It was coarse and unearthly, like Taysha imagined how the gods might sound. She turned and started to run.

The moment her mother saw Taysha take her first step towards the shallow river, she flung the stones at the attackers. Until then, the three men had continued walking slowly and carefully over the slippery river bed. Knowing their prey was secure, they were in no hurry. There was nowhere else to go. For them, it was promised prizes such as these they came for.

The projectiles fell short, as the men were still more than a stone's throw away, but it made them square off their shields and come forward at a quicker pace. The older man with the greying beard who had locked eyes with Taysha reacted swiftly to the sight of the young girl running off across the river. It was clear to him that one immediate entertainment would get away if they didn't hurry. The sounds behind them from the village told them that their brothers-at-war were already looting the village and choosing their women. That meant there would be little left for them.
This would make their stratagem of circumnavigating the village defenders a complete waste. To leave a battle empty-handed was worse than being slain. At least there was honour in being slain. But a young woman ... that was more valuable than gold, or weapons, or armour. To have a life-long slave, a bearer of children as more slaves, entertainment in song, dance and fucking for himself, his sons, and his friends...

No, he couldn't let this go so easily.

He quickened his pace to catch Taysha who was now running into the icy waters with abandon. She was stumbling but not falling. The sting of the cold water meant nothing to her as it splashed up around her.

Her pursuer was soon met by the rocks hurled by her mother. They either missed him or ricocheted off his shield but the heavy sound of impact and told him not to treat the threat lightly.

"Take her!" he yelled to his two younger brethren as he made a slightly larger arc in his path to avoid the flying stones. His command was answered with laughter. The other two were happy with their payment, the woman who stood still in front of them, hurling rocks and muttering prayers to her gods. There was no hurry to collect their quarry. They were content to admire this vicious animal trying desperately to defend her young, though quite uselessly. Like a wild animal caught in a trap, she would snarl and bite and scratch until she was beaten and tamed. All living things can have their free will beaten out of them. The same will happen here. After the first few days of hunger and pain, she would be re-born as their willing servant. Yet the Amazoi woman who stood her ground saw things differently.

As Taysha reached the opposite side of the river she turned around to see her mother reciting not prayers, but the wisdom of her people.

" _The gods do not let us suffer these things, unless we submit to them by our own accord._ The gods do not let us suffer these things, unless we submit to them by our own accord. The gods . . ."

She would not yield, not submit, not stop until the three lay dead at her feet. She saw her greatest chance in the armour-less legs of her daughter's hunter.
A heavy stone and a hard throw landed the projectile at the side of the man's knee. The sound of the impact on the bone and the cry of agony woke the other two men from their daydreams. Fearing to be the next ones to feel the shame of being injured by a woman, they rushed at their prey. The one in front hit her with his shield braced against his shoulder. The only resistance he faced was a missed attempt to hit his uncovered head with an empty fist as he struck her straight in her chest, sending her stumbling backwards. Her heel caught on a deep-set stone and she fell on the back of her head with a crack.

She was victorious in the fight for her daughter's life and freedom. The price of such would be her own life in return. A mere trifle. A payment that she would be willing to make for every day that there ever was or ever will be. For Taysha, it was not such a victory. She had already started to climb up through the dense bushes on the mountainside when she heard the cry of pain from her attacker and she turned to witness the blow that sent her mother to the next life.

Taysha's first thought was that her father or brother would not make it out of the village to save either of them. Her legs weakened and the most morbid idea flashed through her mind. She should just climb back down and just letting them kill her too. Then two things happened that demanded otherwise. The last man of the three, who up to now had done nothing, suddenly dropped his shield and rushed towards her mother. He let his sword fall beside her feet as he started to loosen his pants' string. The one who had struck her mother was doing likewise as he attempted to push off the other man. Taysha was young, but she was experienced enough to know what they were trying to do. A new kind of anger surged up inside her and she almost started to run back and throw stones at them like they were rabid dogs or nasty crows. And she would have, if the man her mother had injured hadn't pointed at her and start heatedly rebuking the other two. The third man of the group looked up and met Taysha's gaze. An extra push from the second man encouraged him to find his sport elsewhere. In an instant Taysha's fury was transformed into fear and she watched in disbelief as the man casually picked up his sword with one hand while holding up his pants with the other.
Then he started to run towards her.

The sudden flood of terror washed clean the feelings of hatred and grief, and she panicked. To escape and survive was all her mind and body could understand now. She scrambled up through the slope of dense foliage. Although lacking the full cover of the summer leaves, the thick brambles and low hanging evergreens offered her concealment. Even in her bewildered state, her first thought was to thank the gods it had not yet snowed and she tried to control her panic enough to make sure she did not leave a clear trail as she ran, just as her father had once taught her.

This area she knew well. It was where she had played with the other children for the last seven winters of her life. Up the mountain, about a stonethrow away from the river, you could clearly see the river but still be hidden in the shadow of the evergreens. This is where the children would spy on their parents and siblings when they were washing clothes, bathing or stealing kisses. Further up the river amid the brambles and thorn bushes you were out of sight of the river. And if you knew exactly where to look, you would find a small level area of ground just big enough for nine or ten men to sleep. It was there, many summers ago, that the older children had made a tunnel through the prickly bushes and cleared it out. The back of the slope made a kind of wall and came around on the sides like a crescent moon. With the brambles surrounding the area, the only way to get in or out was to crawl up through the tunnel. It was the perfect hiding place for children's games. This area had become a village for the children where they could practice and mimic the conversations, mannerisms, songs and dances of the adults. They stored their treasured carvings, ceramics and necklaces there, as well as dried fish, dried berries, smoked meats, fermented berry juice and cannabis. There was even space for a campfire, extra wood and a collection of old furs in each of the two little huts.

It was this Children's Camp that would be Taysha's only hope. Even so, she knew that to run there directly would be a pointless attempt at escape. Expecting to feel the cruel stranger's hand grab the back of her hair or pull at her ankle at every step, she forced herself to follow the well-worn path that led to the clay pits and away from her refuge.
As she ran, she turned her head just enough to catch a glimpse of her pursuer.

He was distracted with untangling himself from the brambles near the bottom of the hill. Taking the brief moment of chance, she jumped behind a large log and crawled carefully up the mountainside and back in the direction of the Children's Camp. When the man had reached the trail, he sped along to catch up to his prize that had suddenly run out of sight. In his state of single focus, he ran right past Taysha and disappeared into a small ravine. Taysha looked at the ground behind her and a new fear gripped her throat. The trail she was leaving was too visible, even in her attempt to be careful. It was obvious a mere child could find her.

Knowing she would have to slow her pace brought tears to her eyes. She would have only a few breaths' time before the man got to the clay pits and doubled back. But she knew better than to carry on any farther in a hurried manner. She would not try to outrun these men. Time and distance meant nothing if there was a trail to follow. She gingerly stepped under twig and fern as she continued on towards the hidden camp. All the while, the voice at the back of her mind pleaded with her to hurry.

The screaming and yelling from across the river seemed to be carried around her by the wind, making each step more and more unbearable. The tears that streamed down her face seemed to be coming from a person other than this disciplined young woman who carefully calculated the distance between her and the calls of her pursuers. The relief she felt when she saw the entrance to the camp was so great she inadvertently blurted out a laugh. Though there was a slightly visible path, to the untrained eye it looked as if it simply went up the mountainside. One would have to be climbing up on hands and knees to see where the tracks led.

Taysha crawled slowly and quietly into the bramble tunnel that led to the open space of her old play area. She was startled by the threat of a sharpened stick pointing at her face. It was held by one of the younger Amazoi men of about 17 Winters. Behind him, sitting with her knees pulled to her chest, was a girl. Like Taysha, she wore thick woven pants, a long winter tunic and had her short, bear-fur mantle draped around her shoulders.

She sat shaking more from fear than the cold.

Taysha quickly understood the young couple had come out to spend the night together.

There was no way they could have gotten across the river without her or her mother seeing them. It was a risky thing for them to do, as this girl had been promised in marriage and it wasn't to the boy crouched in front of Taysha. She knew this well because the girl was her cousin Tara.

As the girls' eyes met it was clear it was not the time for clever words either of rebuke or for ensuring secrecy. The truth was they knew by the sounds coming from the village that their situation was beyond such trivial things. The cries of battle were becoming fewer and yet the lamentations of the women continued.

The motion of the spear-point slowly lowering in front of her brought Taysha back to the moment. She quickly put her fingers to the side of her lips.

"Sh!" Taysha whispered to the boy before he could speak. "Someone's chasing me."

The boy turned his ear towards the sounds of the man as he loudly cursed his way back along the trail.

"Go sit with Tara." whispered the boy so quietly Taysha wasn't sure if she had heard him or just read his lips. She moved quietly past him to sit with her cousin. Taysha tried to be strong and stop her own trembling but Tara's obvious fear fuelled her own. Her mind returned to the image of her mother on the rocks just below them. In her mind, she saw her mother falling over and over again.

" _Maybe she didn't hit her head so hard,"_ she thought, _"Maybe she is just unconscious. Maybe these men will do what they want and leave. Take what they want and leave. I could go back down in a cycle of the sun and wake mother up. Gods curse these men ... Gods curse them and fill their lives with..."_

The last words of her own thoughts stopped her. It was difficult to have them cursed when in reality she knew why they had come. She had seen them many times in her village before. The Amazoi had visitors and traders from only two tribes. One was a tribe that lived at the eastern end of the long valley, and the other was the Hoorg that lived below the waterfall to the south. The brown-haired Hoorg's clothing patterns were distinct from those of the raven black-haired Amazoi.

They used words with _gr, sch, achk_ and other funny sounds. Their true name was unknown to Taysha. They had been called Hoorg by the Amazoi, and never to their faces. The name was adopted from the _Hoorg's_ own language because they were always using the word 'hoorg' when disappointed or angry. It was a word the Amazoi later learned meant "shit".

"That's what their language sounds like..." Taysha quietly mouthed her herself, "like the shit-dogs that their shit-dog-mothers bore."

Rambling thoughts came and went as she tried not to think about the real reason why they had come. She knew perfectly well why they had.

Everyone did.

\- - - - -
It was seven winters ago that the Amazoi first settled where the small village lay, out of sight among the trees on a single, small trading path that led around the curve of the valley from north-south to east-west. This route was secluded and since it was only used between the three tribes it was thought to be relatively safe.

When Taysha was a child, these Hoorg men would come for the purpose of trade. They brought furs, grains, flavourings, soaps, threads, dyes, seeds and dogs and traded them for the Amazoi woven fabrics, boots and clay pots. One summer these men started demanding what the Amazoi viewed as unfair trades. From that point it was understood that the Hoorg felt the land was rightfully theirs and if the Amazoi were not willing to trade on their terms, then they had clearly outstayed their welcome.

The Amazoi felt the idea of laying claim to land that was beyond the Hoorg's direct sight was unreasonable. The Amazoi chief refused their trade requests, and dismissed the Hoorg's demand to leave. That was three winters ago.

Since that time, groups of thirty or more armed Hoorg men would come and assemble on the meadow that lay to the east of the Amazoi village. The Amazoi men would dress themselves in their leather armour and stand about three stonethrows away from the challenging Hoorg. They would stamp their feet and beat their shields with their spears, flash their cocks or asses, stick out their tongues and yell insults that neither side understood. The Amazoi women and children would gather at the edge of the forest and watch silently, while male children too young for battle would eagerly copy the movements and shouts of the warriors.

The most dangerous time was the retrieval of any spears thrown during the exchange of insults. The men from both sides would cross to the open field and if one ventured too far from the pack, there was the inevitable pushing and hitting. Taysha remembers someone getting a broken nose once but cut lips, scratches and black-eyes were the worst that ever happened. Those times were more of an event than a war. They were few in number and only happened during warm weather when the two-day hike up from the Hoorg village wasn't so gruelling.

The antics were a welcome and thrilling distraction from the monotony of everyday life for the children. Although most of the women didn't like to admit it, it was rather fun to watch. In truth, the confrontations had been no more dangerous than the games children play.

Then the last summer came and went and neither the Hoorg nor traders from the eastern tribe appeared.

It wasn't long before an Amazoi hunting party discovered the main trail had been symbolically blocked off at both ends. Each obstruction was about a day's walk away and consisted of a small fallen tree with a sacrificed crow, animal bones and other foul things pegged or tied to it. They were commonly understood warnings of sickness and disease. They also had strange symbols scripted on large rocks that lay in the middle of each path. They were not understood by the Amazoi people but they looked to be of malicious purpose. The villainy had obviously been done by the Hoorg.

When the men of the Amazoi village organised into a council with the chief, they expressed their outrage at being so insulted by such an unmanly practice. There was no honour in such an action. The insult would have to be avenged.

This time, without playing war like children, they would attack them directly and teach them a lesson.

The men from Taysha's village organised themselves that autumn and left one night to sneak over to the Hoorg tribe and back. Their wives and families knew this was different from what had transpired before and they gathered silently at the south entrance of their village until the last man had been consumed by the darkness of the forest.

\- - - - -
The strategy of the Amazoi attack was simply to light fire to arrow shafts wrapped in oiled cloth and burn down the Hoorg huts. They figured they could easily escape into the forest during the confusion. Anyone who didn't make it back before sunrise was to be considered dead or lost.

They left their spears, shields, swords and heavier armour behind. In their backpacks, they carried a goat or deerskin wrapped around spare cloths, dried fruits, berries, smoked meats, twine and extra bowstrings. With their bows and arrows in hand, the men were led off by Rauptu, the chief's son.

Even with the careful single file through the forest, the light load enabled them to turn a three-day hike into two. Following the south trail along the river, they came to the area judged to be a safe distance to set up the rendezvous camp.

The warmth of the autumn day turned cold and damp as the men huddled under their skins for warmth and a natural camouflage. Rauptu sat with his closest friends, which by unwritten law of hierarchy were acknowledged to be the group's commanders of the raid. The others sat or lay close enough to hear them talk as the men conferred about the chances of meeting scouts, which tactics to take, and the level of violence to be expected. The manner in which all this talk was carried out particularly bothered one of the men of the raiding party.

Rafeltu, a man around 30 Winters, sat with clenched fist at this _inner-circle_ of leaders as they attempted to show themselves knowledgeable about such an undertaking. To his ears, they marched through details like they were planning on building a hut; without much thought about the many possible outcomes that awaited them. The idea that it would all be as simple as burning the village from a safe distance and running back to their village made Rafeltu angry.

When they started discussing how to distribute fire to each group for their arrows, he had to turn his head to stop from swearing aloud. They should have thought of this before they left the village. Maybe bring coals from the fires at camp, wrapped in green leaves and re-kindled at the attacking positions, for example.

Rafeltu was the only one brave, or worried, enough to mention his feeling of caution as the leaders moved around without having settled a firm decision on the method of fire. He went too far in saying he thought Rauptu was simply following the emotions of the other men, who were mostly content with following anything as long as it was presented to them with an air of confidence.

Rafeltu was not openly supported by anyone. The majority of the others were more concerned with their own tiredness and were treating the whole event simply like any other unwanted errand or task. To Rauptu's supporters, Rafeltu's comments had an all-too-familiar tone to them and his complaints were attacked harshly. Some of them placed subtle hints that his so-called advice was cowardly.

The chief's son gave Rafeltu a look that told him to mind his own affairs. Rafeltu shrugged and returned to stripping the bark from a fresh branch. A moment later, he took his things and walked out of reach of the light of the fire.

"And how about a little help then, brother?" Rauptu called out after him, catching the attention of the others and adding an edge of provocation. Rafeltu looked around him. There were three or four others already collecting firewood. It was the usual group who were eager to please. The rest were eating or setting up their place to sleep. Rafeltu caught the eye of a friend who smiled back with a subtle shake of the head indicating he got what he deserved for speaking out. Rafeltu scrunched up his face and looked back at Rauptu.

"How big do you want this fire anyway?"

Rauptu just shook his head at him as if he was a disappointed father.

"Pig fucker," Rafeltu mumbled quietly to himself as he broke eye contact and moved behind a small mossy log.

Rafeltu and Rauptu were not truly enemies.

If asked at any other time, both men would have described each other as friends. But having grown up together they knew how to annoy each other well enough.

Rafeltu dropped his sleeping-furs and arranged them with his foot as he looked around at the others. He was mad at each of them for not opposing those who were obviously trying to look like knowledgeable leaders.
" _Who can blame them?"_ he thought with a sigh, _"We aren't warriors or raiders. What do we know about these things?"_

His thoughts trailed to the conversations of the women and elders before they left the village. He noted how the women's opinions varied as much as the men's. Some said they should seek to end the troubles by talking. Some wanted just to move away and, surprisingly, there were a few who honestly thought it best if they went and killed all of the Hoorg; man, woman and child.

He could understand each opinion. After all, each one had its reasoning behind it. Yet of all the choices that could be made, what they were doing now would surely be the least profitable in the end. In fact, he couldn't help but notice that he couldn't trace the origins of the plan to any one man. It was as if the voice of a mischievous god had whispered it in the wind and they were now embarking on an ill-fated path. For after this raid, they would have to be on watch forever lest the same thing happen to them. None of the young or the women could wander through the forest alone again. Each night the random barking of their dogs would wake every sane person.

"We aren't warriors." he repeated to himself aloud as he fell back into his sleeping-furs for the night. Rafeltu could not sleep. He spent the time lying still so as not to circulate the cold air as he stared at a large blade of grass bending heavily in front of him.

He was then surprised to find himself waking up to the smell of smoke. He looked up into the dark sky and then turned over to see a group making breakfast as the fire crackled and roared. He never noticed how loud a fire was before. Usually it was a welcome sound when out hunting because it scared away other predators and ensured _he_ was not the food at the end of the hunt. But this was different. Rafeltu's heart starting beating uncontrollably. It was most likely due to being just woken in the midst of a deep sleep, but the sounds of the men talking at regular volume _raised his fur_. There were no signs of light from the sun yet. He lay silent as some of the other men started to groggily gather around the fire for warmth and a cup of hot mint drink. To Rafeltu's dismay, they were soon standing around chatting and laughing in full voice.

"These idiots," he thought, just as a voice from one of the others called for less noise. This was answered by Wirfel who, standing over the fire warming his hands, answered back that the fire would attract anyone long before their voices would. Rafeltu hated Wirfel. The bulky tree of a man.

At least Rafeltu's disagreements with Rauptu had some element of mutual respect. Rafeltu and Wirfel shared no common ground. The name Wir-fel meant "protective thorn" and that summarized Rafeltu's opinion of the man's character. Just as thorny bushes were used as a protective wall around the Amazoi village, they were still a pain to be near. And Rafeltu doubted either would ever be effective in stopping an attack from a determined man or animal.

Keeping positions of power in the Amazoi village had always been a game of balance. Rafeltu knew Rauptu was aware that an out-of-place comment, forceful wording, or an open insult could have half of the men just getting up and walking home. Everyone was linked to three main families in the Amazoi tribe, which could make decision-making personal when one group found themselves on unpopular ground and people started taking sides. Half the chief's decisions were based more on family ties than rational thought. It was this underlying politics that bothered Rafeltu. As far as he was concerned, there needed to be one people. One voice. So the village moved as one body in one direction. At least that way, even a wrong decision would be more respected than this half-hearted decision-making that happened far too often. That was really why Rauptu's failure to silence the men annoyed Rafeltu so much. He knew it was only because it was easier not to. He would bend to the more vocal group and their leader, Wirfel, while the majority that knew better were scattered about in the forest.

Rafeltu lay there trying to convince himself that even in the worst case possible the Hoorg wouldn't just come up and kill everyone anyway. The two tribes had always followed unwritten rules as neighbours. Rafeltu had to admit he was impressed with the leadership of the Hoorg. The ability to organize thirty or more men to climb all the way up to the Amazoi village and engage in their childish battles was a feat in itself.

Rafeltu sat up and pinched the sleep out of his eyes.

Most of the men around the fire were wrapping their arrowheads with cloth. Rafeltu had already prepared his arrows before he had left the village. He practiced pulling them out of the quiver without pulling off the wrappings, feeling the weight and adjusting his technique when shooting. The fact he had been the only one he knew was doing so didn't sit well with him from the start.

" _I wonder if any of these guys are thinking of how much the added weight will throw their arrows off,"_ he thought as he picked up his sleeping-fur to move farther away from the fire and into the safety of the shadows.

"Rafeltu, where are you going?" one of the men at the fire called out. In the surrounding forest, it sounded almost like a yell that made Rafeltu hunch his back as if someone had thrown something at him. He turned around with an annoyed look to find it was one of the younger ones who had called to him. He was a nice kid but he should be smarter than to follow the lead of a bunch of idiots. They were on a raid, for the sake of the gods.

"Quiet, boy," he hissed while flashing his eye to the crowd at the fire hoping they would all get the hint. They did. They knew Rafeltu was an opinionated man. He was not the most popular person in the village but not necessarily hated either. He certainly was not mean spirited but he always seemed to swim against the current. So they took the hint for a while. Yet they had returned to talking at full volume by the time Rafeltu slipped back to sleep.

The night sky had started to turn to day. Rafeltu woke and lay cursing under his breath at every laugh and every sound that came from those around the fire. The sound of someone walking up behind him from the direction of the fire prompted him to turn around. It was Rauptu, still absent-mindedly carrying a smouldering stick from the fire.

"We're almost ready to go," he said in a whisper when he approached, "We just have to decide who goes with who."

Rafeltu nodded, "Just don't pair me off with Wirfel or I'll end up killing him."

Rauptu laughed through his nose in an understanding way.
He looked over his shoulder to see no one was within earshot. "Yeah. I know... He's not... well, you know. What can we say that we haven't said a hundred times before? I can understand how you feel. To half these guys it's a game. The other half who understands the consequences of what we're doing ... they're divided by those who want to run like the gods themselves were after them. The other half ... they're looking forward to all this."

Rafeltu sat up and wiped his eyes. He wished Rauptu could show this side of himself more often in front of the others, but that was just the way of things.

"Then why not let those of us who can do this properly do it?" Rafeltu quickly replied, revealing his thoughts at last.

"What do you mean?" Rauptu asked with raised eyebrows. "You going to go off and kill everyone?"

Rafeltu just wiped his hand down his face and across his beard as he looked away. He knew when Rauptu wasn't going to listen. There was no point in saying anything else.

"I don't think any of us could do that," Rauptu continued, answering his own question, "No. This is the best solution. We need to do this as one body."

It seemed to Rafeltu that Rauptu had said it more to convince himself than anything.

" _Only because you follow your father's weakness and ask permission to lead,"_ thought Rafeltu, but wisely decided not to say so.

"Come. I'll mix those of stealth and good common sense with those without. It should even things out," Rauptu said as he turned back to the fire.

"Even things out?" Rafeltu asked as he swiped at Rauptu's pants to get him to stop. "Now I'll be with a group that will get me killed. Wonderful. No thanks."

Rauptu didn't answer verbally, but he did give Rafeltu a wave of his hand and the slightest nod of his head before heading back. With everyone gathered at the fire, either through the course of good Fortune or the clever handling of Rauptu, Rafeltu gratefully found himself with two younger men that he knew thought well of him. That would mean they would at least listen to his instructions.

The first thing Rafeltu did was to take out one of his arrows and tell his companions they should get a feel for the added weight before proceeding. He said it loud enough for everyone around him to hear and gradually every member of the tribe was notching their arrows and testing the new flight pattern. Rafeltu noted to himself that this would save the first volley of arrows from landing in the mud at the foot of the huts. At least he had done one thing to aid in the success of the raid.

The leaders of each group were given a burning coal wrapped in bark. The ten teams of three men were instructed to spread out on both sides of the valley in a crescent around the Hoorg encampment. When the first arrow was shot, all were to loose theirs until none remained.

This raised a series of questions and arguments in the instant it was mentioned.

"Who will loose the first arrow?"

"I will," answered Rauptu, who up to this point had been doing fairly well. But as one question was answered two more took its place, until he had no more answers to give.

"What if you are captured or killed or are busy fighting? Then who will loose the first arrow?"

"You'll wait for us to move around to the sides before shooting, right?"

"What if we can't get a fire going in time?"

"How will we see each other?"

"What if we get lost or run into a Hoorg along the way?"

"You realize those of us at the end of this 'crescent' have a better chance of getting killed, don't you?"

Their babbling became so overwhelming it was hard to focus on one point before another pushed into its place.

"Enough!" Rauptu ended the debate with a raise of his hand, "Each will do as his good sense dictates. We don't have time for these details."

" _Details that should have been decided before we left,"_ thought Rafeltu. But he held his tongue.

He had determined long ago that this was the result of a decision formed on emotions and high words. No one had the strength to openly say, "We go to war. We go to kill," thus the attitude of the group so far. To most it remained a game. A child's prank. Sneaking and Fire. How exciting.

Some even openly showed their excitement about the chance to kill someone. For most it was merely a task that was part of their daily duties.

By now the day was dangerously upon them. It wouldn't be too long before the sun showed it's face over the crest of the eastern mountains and stream into the valleys. Wirfel mentioned something about how it would lessen the effect of a burning hut during the daylight. Rafeltu was more concerned about the chance of being seen. But, the daylight would also allow for easier movement and it would be harder for the Hoorg to see the fires that would clearly give away everyone's positions. It was obvious they would not get away with creeping through the forest with fire during the night.

By any process, in the end, it would become a loud clamour and a mad scramble for home. It was a pity for those stationed on the outer points of the crescent who had farther to run back than the rest of them. It was there Rafeltu and his group found themselves. They were second to the end on the west side of the river just above the trading trail.

For the most part, making their way to the attack point was no different from any other walk through the forest. They made intermittent stops to check around them while concentrating mainly on where they stepped on the steep sloping of the forested mountainside. Despite Rafeltu's original questioning of his brethren's lack of concentration on the coming battle, his mind had also drifted far away when the group of three in front of them was discovered by a Hoorg man. Rafeltu knew the village lay just out of sight below the waterfall down the hill to his right. That was where the man stood hooting and hollering warnings back to his brethren. It was uncertain if the man had seen more than the first group of three but it was certain he wasn't waiting around to find out either. In the moment Rafeltu noticed him, he was gone in a flash, back down to the lower valley.

The alarm was instantly raised. From Rafeltu's view point he could only see his Amazoi brothers of the first group shooting after the fleeing man with their arrows but his continued cries of warning told him they were not successful in killing him. Soon there were more shouts coming from the Hoorg village.

Not knowing what to do, Rafeltu decided to keep still. A lifetime of hunting taught him movement was the enemy of the hunted. He and the two with him lay back along a fallen tree, mossy and soft with age, and covered themselves with the few remaining ferns of the season to wait and see what would happen.

The alarm the man had raised resulted in the Hoorg men leaving the village en masse to pursue the invaders. The three who had been spotted were clever enough not to lead them directly back towards those groups who followed. Neither did they lead them up and above them. They made a sprint down the hill to meet the Hoorg on the trading trail. Rafeltu and his contingent lay and quietly held their breath as the Hoorg men ran into view. They watched to their relief as the three Amazoi shot an arrow each and easily made their escape back up the trail towards their village. Shortly after, a second group of Hoorg showed themselves at the bottom of the trail and stood watching the chase. Rafeltu thought it would have been an excellent place for an ambush had they planned it right.

As the others joined the pursuers in the hunt for the invaders, Rafeltu found himself at the far end of the crescent with groups of armed Hoorg scanning the mountainside for signs of them. It was a gift from the gods that one of the Hoorg spotted an Amazoi group on the opposite side of the river and the second chase began.

Keeping one eye on the running axemen, Rafeltu noticed they were heading off in the direction of Rauptu at the center of the crescent. Just like was mentioned at the fire earlier that day. Now what? What if they give chase to Rauptu?

Ideas flooded through Rafeltu's head until he realized the two young men with him lay looking at him. He would just have to make a decision and follow through. He knew that if he turned around as well, the groups behind him in line would see it as a retreat and follow suit. That was, if there were still any of them left behind. They could have all taken off after the first group that made their retreat. It would have been understandable in the sudden confusion. For Rafeltu, now, it would be an unspeakable cowardice. It wasn't something he would want to live with after having expressed his opinion on how it all should have been done better.

"We'll head to a good position and wait and see. We'll decide what to do from there," he said, and the three of them rose quietly. Crouched over, they started moving slowly towards the side of the mountain that overlooked the Hoorg village. Rafeltu was thankful to the gods for the two young men that followed. He could clearly picture Wirfel having stood and shot at the pursuers. Yelling... Acting the _bird_...

These two followed him deeper into the middle of the conflict. With people running all over the place, there was no telling were someone might come out from behind a bush. The three were startled briefly by the other group of Amazoi that had been following them. They had made their way up higher and now were almost directly to Rafeltu's left. Each group quickly acknowledged the other by wave and nod. Feeling secure that at least they were not alone, they continued onwards.

The yells and hoots of the chase were leading further away up the valley. Still, there were groups of Hoorg scouting around much too close for comfort. If they did carry out their plan, they could easily find themselves surrounded on the way back. Without their weapons and heavy armor, it wouldn't be too hard for the Hoorg to take down every group of three, one at a time.

The thought gave Rafeltu an expected rush of fear greater than watching the Hoorg run past. That had been more a feeling of excitement. This hit him suddenly and deep inside. Thoughts of his pregnant wife, his sons and daughter mixed with imagining what it would be like to be killed, and their reactions to hearing of his death. The images in his head were enough to convince him that they were in a good enough position and he stopped. It obviously wasn't the best they could do but no one was arguing. They were hidden among the smaller bushes yet could see three huts of the Hoorg village clear enough to shoot at. They had lost sight of the other group above them and could see no one else following.

" _Always keep your groups large and spaced within sight of one another,"_ Rafeltu noted to himself as if this would give him a chance to learn and improve if he ever needed to do it again. He sighed heavily and looked at the two young men with him,

"This could turn out really, really bad."

The true horror of the situation permeated Rafeltu's body.

His leg started convulsing into brief shivers and his hands started sweating to the point of wondering if he could even notch his arrows properly. His stomach felt sick and his insides quivered in spasms of fear.

" _After all my arrogance,"_ he thought, _"I'll end up being the least able to perform."_

Through his rush of panic, he realized the two young men had started to go down the steep embankment in front of him.

"Stop!" he hissed with his arms outstretched, gesturing. How were they planning to light their arrows from down there? Not to mention that going down that bank meant having to come back up. If they were caught down there, it would be like spearing fish in a shallow pool. The only ways of escape were a difficult climb or through the village itself.

The two came back up and crouched beside him without excuse or explanation. Rafeltu looked around. They were too far from the village to do serious damage. He could only see two huts clearly from where he was. The third roof seemed to offer up a half-and-half chance of being hit.

The sounds of the chase were now echoing up and down the valley, adding to his fear of being surrounded. He knew if they started shooting up the camp now, the screams of the women would bring the Hoorg men back in force.

"Too dangerous here. More to the left," he said, not knowing fully if it was wisdom or cowardice that prompted him.

" _If it is cowardice,"_ he reasoned with himself, _"I would already be heading far, far away."_

During their careful movement across the valley side, he could see some more of the Hoorg men running up from their settlement to join the pursuit. Rafeltu figured some of them had doubled-back as they mostly ran out in small groups of twos and threes. He noticed that each person climbing after the other was more heavily armoured; a breastplate or grieves being fastened in place as they ran, some with two axes, the last couple of men with shield and helmet. From his advantageous position, Rafeltu could see that those ascending the steep trail from the village to the top of the waterfall had to keep their eyes on the ground to climb. That at least gave the Amazoi an extra advantage in moving.

The Fortunes of War favoured Rafeltu and the remaining groups on the left side of the crescent in other ways as well. The steep angle of their side of the valley compared to the east side naturally led the defenders away from them. To add to this good luck, the Amazoi groups on the east bank started firing their lit arrows first and as one would expect, the camp exploded in cries and shouts. The Hoorg warriors who had first given chase started to return, or circle back across, to the other side of the river, huffing and puffing as they ran.

From the sounds of it, some of the Amazoi who had first been chased away were now coming back down the trail, yelling insults at the now confused Hoorg.

" _It must be Rauptu,"_ thought Rafeltu, _"He would still have kept his head. He must have been trying to lead them away from us. Well done ... Well led."_

Rafeltu saw the other group that had started out behind them. They were now above and ahead of him struggling to climb over a great bramble-laden log.

Not wanting to attract undue attention from the Hoorg now running in the opposite direction, Rafeltu tried to signal the men. He quickly clicked his tongue on the top of his mouth like a squirrel's chatter and the three looked over at him. He motioned for them to stop climbing and head for the bottom of the fallen tree. Rafeltu had noticed the log was extending out over an outcrop that jutted out from the cliff overlooking the small valley below. It would provide them with a fuller view of the Hoorg huts while giving them protection from anyone trying to attack from that side of the village.

Rafeltu could now turn his attention to restarting the coal embers for the fire. As he did, he could see Utkan, the leader of the other group, making his way over to him.

"Who else was behind you?" Rafeltu asked as he broke twigs over the smouldering coal.

"Two others. Portay and Falotra and their groups," answered the wide-eyed group leader. A chubby quiet man, this was certainly not Utkan's choice way to spend an afternoon. Rafeltu grinned to himself at this observation. Though still shaking he smiled boldly and said, _"This_ is why the gods have chosen us this day. Let's not waste it. Take some fire to your boys and start shooting."

In the distance, a couple of huts on the east side were already burning and seemed to be drawing the focus of the remaining Hoorg. From along the precipice, Rafeltu and the five archers had a clear view of the village huts along the base of the hill. Rafeltu waited for everyone to be ready and after a moment of hesitation as they looked at each other, they fired at the same time. Overhanging branches caught a couple arrows and set the evergreens alight in a ray of sparks and crackles.

While scrambling to get his second arrow lit and loosed before the brunt of an armoured group fell upon them, Rafeltu noticed an elderly woman standing in the clearing of the village. Beside her were two huts already alight. The woman was standing, pointing at them and he was sure she was looking straight at him. The calm anger and fierceness in her eyes made him feel as though he had been caught by his grandmother in some mischief or another.

" _You are lucky we did not come to kill,"_ he thought boldly, but the feeling of being scolded by her like a naughty boy made the bowstring heavy. The arrow he loosed found its way to the farthest hut in his line of view. He looked down to his remaining arrows. As he did, the thought that they could not and would not escape repercussions from this event echoed in his mind. It slowed his movements. The thought of the woman made him look back, but she wasn't there any more. Rafeltu wondered if the hut he had just hit was hers. Perhaps she had run inside to save her memories, or her children, or an elderly husband.

Rafeltu was sure they had made a terrible mistake in doing all this, yet his hands strung the next arrow and shot it randomly. His eyes were back on the arrows by his feet before his loosed arrow had landed. He continued in that fashion with most of his shots landing harmlessly in the dirt around the village. He handed one of his last two arrows to the younger man beside him, lit the last for himself and shot it into the sky. He didn't see or care where it fell.

"Let's go" he said quietly and started scrambling up the hill. Not all the others heard him but they need not have. At the sight of him turning to leave, they were more than happy to follow.

"Up the right side of the log!" Rafeltu yelled as the sudden urgency to get away took hold. To his ears, the words sounded more like a suggestion than a command.

He grabbed a sapling that was growing on the log to pull himself up and it ripped out of the rotting wood. He fell backwards and landed upside down on the downward slope with the plant still in his hands. His two young comrades quickly helped him up and he looked intently back over his shoulder at the smoke from the village.

The tide of Hoorg warriors had shifted from heading west to heading back towards Rafeltu.

The realization they had been stupid to have used all their arrows crept over him. Now they had nothing left to dissuade someone from following them all the way back home.

" _Another lesson on war,"_ he added it to his mental list and turned back to grab a sturdier tree.

\- - - - -
Taysha sat holding Tara at the Children's Camp as she continued to battle against the shakes. Her mind was focused on the days when the men who had gone to attack the Hoorg gradually returned. Those who returned first in groups of three or more were unusually quiet. At least, they had been unexpectedly quiet. There had been some pre-conceived expectation of them marching back boldly with tales and songs of bravery, but each group would enter the village silently and drink their warm herb and root tea with sullen faces.

Taysha's father and brother were among the first ones home. Neither of them looked in the mood to tell what had happened and Taysha's mother did not ask.

It was humbling for Taysha as she watched the anxiety grow on the faces of the women whose men had not yet returned. It worsened with the whispered tellings of those who had arrived first about how confusing things had become on the western side of the river. As the time slowly passed, the worried murmurings amongst the women turned to vigilant guard as they stood outside the bramble-bush fence looking south for their returning men.

Taysha didn't know why, but she felt guilty as well as a little scared. Her father had returned safely as had her eldest brother. Her betrothed had been deemed too young to go in the first place. She became afraid the women whose men had not returned would be envious of those whose men had. It was an irrational fear but it drove her to avoid those still waiting and instead sit with the women whose men were safely home. It was the fate of the gods. They could only wait to see.

Taysha also remembered there was a clear division between the men that did return.

She remembered the one called Rafeltu. He argued for them to pack up the village and head back down the east valley from where they had come. He said they were no longer safe because of what they had done. He was shaken and very vocal. After realizing the chief would not order a move, he ended up taking down his hut and had relocated his family to somewhere outside the village within days.

All the while the turmoil over the missing men continued.

Two men from the same group had disappeared. The third man who was with them said they had been separated by the Hoorg and the terrain on the way back. Many questions and accusations by the family and friends of the two lost followed the sole survivor from that day on. Rauptu came to his aid and there was no more open discussion about it but the poor man was looked upon by some as though it was his fault. Perhaps he had heard his comrade's pleas for help but was overtaken by fear and he ran on. Perhaps he ran when he should have fought.

These things Taysha would now never know. Yet she thought of these events as she compared that day with what she was going through. At that moment, she felt a strange bond between herself and the sole survivor of that group. What was his name? She struggled to remember. A tribe of only a hundred or so people and she was so bad with names outside of her immediate group, especially those of the older ones. She wondered if that poor man was down there now. Was he fighting? Was he killed? If so, was he finally at peace?

Her scattered thoughts were jarred into the present by the noises made by her pursuer. He had found the small trail that led up past the Children's Camp. He was so close that Taysha could hear his heavy breathing and mumbled curses as he scrambled up the mountain slope. Following the natural route around the large patch of brambles, he now stood less than a stonethrow above them. Taysha and Tara froze like young fawns. Taysha felt sick and desperately wanted to cry out for help.

The Hoorg man stood catching his breath to curse the vanished girl, his misfortune, and the pain in his lungs. He turned to half scramble, half slide back down the hill, stopping to gingerly weave his way through the brambles and thorns at the bottom near the river. Taysha could hear his comrades yell something to him, which he answered in a frustrated tone.  
The voices still came from the direction where her mother lay.

" _They'd better not be doing anything to her,"_ she threatened in her mind, _"I'll kill them. I'll kill all of them. After I shove sticks in their asses and make them sit. I swear. I swear to the great Goddess Uverbin. They will pay for all this."_

As Tara gradually came to understand that they were out of harm's way, she let out a flood of sobs and tears.

"Sh!" snapped the boy from over his shoulder.

The sudden rebuke actually angered Taysha.

Mostly because she desperately wanted to cry too.

The boy was clearly as scared as they were, but there was something about him keeping watch on the entrance to their hiding place with his pointed stick that she suddenly greatly envied. His gaze lingered on the girls, and seeing their state, his anger melted from his face.

Ripples of fear took over Taysha's body and Tara held her closer, trying to keep both of them from completely losing control.

"Don't cry, don't cry. It will be all right," Tara repeated. Taysha wasn't so certain Tara wasn't just saying it to convince herself, if not just saying it out of habit. All three of them knew it would never be all right again. Everything would be bad from this day onward, whether they survived or not. Everything had been lost.

"All is lost." Taysha repeated her thoughts out loud and proceeded to weep, burying her face in Tara's fur cloak.

The three hardly moved all morning. The cries from the village seemed to last forever, while at the same time it seemed they heard less and less of them with every breath they took. At one point it felt as though the only sound on Earth was the hoots and laughs of the conquerors. They were no doubt standing in the village circle having found the supplies of distilled berries, desecrating the gods' tribute and readying their trophies for the journey home.

By this time all three in the Children's Camp had cried themselves out. The feelings of thirst and hunger reminded them they were still alive and could not sit there forever. Taysha sat cross-legged with her head hanging, slack jawed and staring at Tara's head that now lay in her lap. The boy still sat with his back to them facing down the entrance, neither moving nor hardly breathing. He finally turned to the girls and forced his tongue to conjure up saliva for his parched mouth as he formed the words in his head.

"I ... I'll go down to see who's left," his whisper was hardly audible, "We can bring them up here. For protection. See what's happened ... get some water."

Tara sat up straight when he mentioned going down.

"No, no you can't!" she answered him in a sharp whisper. The sound of her voice so close to Taysha's ear after so long a silence made her flinch. She looked back at the ground. Her head swayed as though she had taken Smoke from the sacred plants. Her mind was drifting and she felt as if she was watching the happenings from afar.

" _It's the same thing again,"_ she noted in her head, _"I have to go ... don't go ... it makes no sense. Why does he have to go? Why is Tara pleading for him not to? Such an obvious thing for her to say? Leaving here is dangerous. But, we can't stay here forever. Men go because they can. Because they can change the situation. Women don't go because they know they are helpless ... instead, their only strength is to cry out. But the men go ... because they can .... it must be nice to be a man. To have that power. The power to change the situation or die. Not be helpless and raped and taken away. I would rather die. I would rather kill those that dared try ... I would rather ..."_

"Taysha," Tara repeated, pulling her arm and making her twitch in surprise. Taysha's senses flooded back as she watched Tara move over next to her man and whisper back, "We're going down to see what's happened. See if anyone is there. Maybe get more food ... clothing ... you know."

Taysha greeted the statement blankly and then looked down.

" _I'm so tired,"_ she thought, _"It can't still be the same day."_

She glanced back up at Tara and her lover getting ready to leave the safety of their hiding place. They kissed and he put his hand on her cheek. Taysha looked away.

" _Funny... Why did I just look away? Out of respect for my cousin, perhaps? Doesn't matter any more, really. Doesn't matter who she's fucking. No one is alive. What will we do? Will we both become his wives? Will we be the only survivors?"_

At the sight of the two starting to climb through the bramble tunnel, a wave of panic hit Taysha. It made her stand up and look around, even though she knew she could not see out of their little fortress. Her stomach cramped. She envisioned them never coming back, her staying there alone at night, her being alone forever. She couldn't live like that. She paced around the fireplace of the small area, trying to order herself to relax. She wanted to run out after them but the Fear grabbed hold. She knew she simply had to regain her senses and composure.

Her swarming thoughts took her to the one woman in the tribe who was insane. She had turned so after losing both her boys to a river flooding. Taysha hated her and she knew why.

It was from watching how her husband carried himself with such dignity after loosing his boys to death, and his wife to insanity. Though Taysha now understood the effects that the death of a loved one can have on the heart and spirit, she could find little pity for the woman. Taysha stopped pacing and looked up at the swaying trees.

"She was so selfish," she said to the sky, trying to convince herself, "She was selfish and I can't be like that."

Her mind focused on the calmness of the father and his admirable strength compared to the woman who chose to lose her mind.

"I can't become like her. I must be brave. I must be strong," she told herself as she took a deep breath to calm her heart.

Although still shaky and sick to her stomach, she turned towards the tunnel of brambles and quickly climbed through. Coming out the other side, she caught a glimpse of Tara disappearing through the bushes below on the edge of the river. Taysha knew it unwise and useless to call out to her. The sounds of the river would be filling Tara's ears anyway. So, she mutely hurried along to catch up to them. By the time she had made it to the brambles just above the river, Tara and her man had crossed to the other side and were making their way to the village.

More noise from the river. No need to call out.

Taysha's eyes were pulled to the body of her mother. Her tunic was tattered and pulled up past her breasts. Her pants and fur cloak had been stolen. Taysha stood as still as possible in the hope she would see her mother breathe. But she did not. She lay as still as the rocks around her. Taysha quickly looked away and saw Tara staring at her mother as she passed by.

"Insensitive dog. Always was." snapped Taysha, knowing she couldn't be heard anyway. The brief sight of her mother's ravaged body and her unwarranted thoughts of hate toward Tara caused Taysha to stop and sit as her breath came shallow and fast. Her heart began racing and the tears once again welled.

But she had no time for a single tear to fall. Out of the corner of her eye she saw movement on the far bank of the river. Her ears heard Tara's scream of "NO!" and the boy's command to run.

Taysha's heart skipped in fear. Her now fragile mind had convinced her this was just what had happened earlier. That she was in fact witnessing the event she had been part of. Except this time it was Tara, not she, who was running for her life.

It couldn't possibly be happening again. Not now.

Taysha moved slowly and jerkily as if her body was trying to stop her from accepting the horrors of the truth. Yet she saw more Hoorg men coming down from the undergrowth between the river bed and the village, only this time not at a walking pace as before. There were more than Taysha could count in a glance. Six? Twelve? It mattered little.

Her instincts had grown tenfold that morning and in one smooth motion her body was already turning to climb the mountain slope yet again. This time she did not take the time to stop and look. Taysha thought of the improbable chance the boy could defend them off with the sharpened stick. That stick. That stupid sharpened stick. The helplessness of the situation flooded Taysha's senses as she let out a "Hah!" before gulping back the laugh in shame.

Her feet felt as if hands from the ground had reached up and were holding her down at each step. The sounds from behind her grew in earnest and volume. She was sure she heard Tara fall into the river. Taysha's first thoughts were to apologize to Tara about what she said about her when she looked at her mother.

" _Who will come to view our bodies?"_ she thought as she scrambled up the hill once more, _"Who will bury us?"_

In her flight, Taysha's instincts told her very clearly not to go back to the Children's Camp. She argued with herself, hoping they had not made a discernable trail to the thorn fortress but of course they had. Any man worth his salt could track something so obvious as that. How many men were behind her? Would they continue the chase? Could she fend off the attackers at the entrance with a sharpened stick of her own?

"That cunt stick ... haha ... It's too ... too much ..."

For the second time that day, Taysha rethought her decision to flee in mid-stride and stopped and turned to look down at the river. The first thing she saw was a young Hoorg, about the age of Tara's man, standing on the opposite side of the river and drawing back on his bow. He was aiming it at her.

The thought of where he had come from and how he had gotten so close to the river so fast raced through her mind. Yet the only thought she could muster was, _"He can't be serious."_

She drew the ironic comparison of how Tara's man had sat diligently on guard all day to protect her and Tara. Now this one, this boy of the same age, was trying to kill her? Why? She wasn't part of this rivalry. She wasn't part of this petty war between their tribes. Was he doing it to get a "Good work, Son!" from his father? Would it not destroy his spirit as he destroyed her?

Wooosh – Thud

Her questions were answered by the arrow that flew past her within an arm's length and hit the ground above and behind her. She stood staring at the young man as he kept his eye on her while searching for a second arrow with his free hand. He looked just as if he were hunting deer or a wolf. No feeling could be read in his eyes. These Hoorg were insane. No, she would not be killed by one of them. Not today. Not ever. She would not be taken, neither would she be killed.

She made a quick check upstream and saw other men run towards the river crossing. She couldn't see clearly what had happened to Tara and her man but she could see the movement of several Hoorg men in the place where Tara had been running back to.

It was obvious Taysha was now alone. Her heart skipped and it drew her back to her senses. She turned to run away from her childhood fort and from the gamble of safety, and ran for her life. It was a race in which she could not rely on the favour of the gods. It was obvious the mischievous deities had chosen other things for her people. She would have to get away on her own intelligence, determination and skill.

A quick calculation told her that running up the hill would only put her in a position for the stupid boy to actually hit her. Perhaps he missed on purpose. Perhaps. But she was not willing to find out. She ran parallel to the river along the path to the clay pits.

The second arrow crashed through the branches above her head. As she pushed onwards, she thanked the gods for the Hoorg boy not being a good shot. Then the image of these 'gods' flashed through her mind; they stood smiling as they enjoyed watching the chase.

The clamour of the men climbing to get to the path echoed behind her. Straight ahead of her in the distance she could see the Amazoi clay pits with holes dug out in the side of the mountain.

Taysha felt the soft, slippery clay imbed under her nails as she clawed her way up towards the top of the hill. She thought if she had the knowledge of pottery making, she could help make pots to trade when she reunited with those left from the attack. The thought suddenly seemed so stupid to her that she stifled another nervous laugh as she grabbed a tree root to pull herself to the top. She told herself it would be better to spend the energy of thought on questions like where she could go. What if the Hoorg men stayed in the village and she couldn't go back? What would she do for food? Clothing? Tools? Where was she running to? How long should she stay away before trying to get back?

Her burning lungs and quickened breath prompted her to stop at the top of the knoll above the clay. She looked back down to see three men after her. One was dangerously close. He had already made it to the bottom of the pits. The second wasn't far behind while the third was quickly gaining ground in the distance. The unmistakable sight of the boy with the bow as the last of the three made her sob.

"Leave me alone!" she screamed at them as a last warning.

The men looked up but didn't miss a step in their pace to catch her. The boy with the bow only mimicked her language, crying, "Lemmelone! Lemmelone!" as he kept running forward.

The true horror of the situation was like a dream. It made no sense at all. Thankfully she noticed one thing that differed from any fearful dream she had in the past; her legs worked. Though her heart felt as if it were beating in her throat, she wasn't bogged in mud or being pulled from behind by some invisible force. She could run. She could get out. But the reality of the situation was that she knew she wouldn't be able to outrun these fully grown men for long. The fear of thinking she couldn't do it made her hesitate yet again as she gulped for air and tears clouded her vision.

Her body seemed to lean itself against a small tree on its own accord while her mind screamed at her to flee.

She was giving up and it disgusted her.

Then, as the weight of her shoulder pressed into the tree, the fickle gods seemed to change their minds...

The closest of her pursuers was attempting to climb straight up the clay slope. He slipped on his first step and almost ended up on his nose. The instant he did she knew he wouldn't be able to make it to the top. The other two men caught up to the first and jumped and slipped and clawed down to the base of the muddy cliff. They were too heavy and bulky. The only people she'd ever seen climb the clay slopes were children and the more skilled Amazoi men who had done it all their lives.

A rush of arrogance swept over Taysha as she looked down on the struggling men. They were struggling because of their stupidity not to go back two steps and climb around.

"Fools." she whispered down at them. She then pointed to the first man directly below her.

"If I could kill you now, I would." she said in a voice so calm she thought it must have come from somewhere else. Her eyes turned to the one with the bow, knowing if they couldn't climb up, he would start loosing arrows at her again. She wanted to remember him. She wanted to find him again. Even if it was in the After Life or in the next life reborn.

One of the men took out his dagger and stabbed at the clay to pull himself up to places of leverage. Taysha saw her time was short. She turned and ran. Without hesitation. Without thought. She ran beyond the cries of the men. She ran upwards away from the sounds of the river. She ran even though she tripped, crawled or stumbled. Her lungs felt as if she had inhaled fire and she could no longer feel her legs. Her winter tunic was soaked in sweat and her feet slipped because of the sweat in her leather boots. The cold winter morning had turned hot as she ran without pause. The pain growing in her side only encouraged her further. Treating it as though it was an enemy, she heard the pain attempting to woo her.

" _Here. Let's rest. There's no danger now. Let's enjoy the sun."_

She revelled in her ability to refuse its honeyed tongue and press onward. In her mind she saw no other purpose in life other than to follow the sun. Around the ridge of the mountain and on to the West. Towards the home of the gods and the eternal land of the Great Waters. Salty and vast beyond measure, it was where the Spirit Boat would come and take her soul to the After Life.

It was where the spirit of her mother was undoubtedly heading now. Yes, that would do as a direction to head in. That is where she would go.

"Follow the setting sun. It will lead you there." she gasped out the verse from the song of Prayer for the Dead. She would see this Great Water with her own eyes and then she would die and be taken across the waters to her family. It will be a beautiful place to end her life on earth and it would be easier for the Boat Master to collect her spirit. It was a death welcomed by this young woman on the eve of her fourteenth Winter. One who had already seen too much of what this life offered. Any death not dealt by those pig-fucking Hoorg would be good for her.

The sun was sinking behind the mountains and taking with it the little heat of the day there was. The coldness crept out of the earth once again to reclaim its lands. Taysha had made attempts to keep high up on the mountain while going around it. That meant her night would be cold up among the high winds.

She started down into the next valley until she came to a small creek where she sat to drink. The water gave her a painful headache from its coldness. Her legs ached and her nose ran continuously. She could feel Torak, the Spirit of the River and Cold, creeping up on her as if he was rising from the river itself.

She sat massaging her legs as she told herself the story of how Uverbim, the Goddess of Creation, had made humans from fire from the goddess Tabita and water from her brother and bitter rival, Torak. This mixture that made up mankind placed man and woman in a situation where they are both loved and hated by both the two deities. It was the protection of Uverbim that kept them safe from any undue anger. Taysha would be unharmed by them both if she treated them respectfully.

This lesson she learned from an early age from her father.

Oh, her father. She realized only now how precious he was to her. A quiet and giving man, he had become more of a symbol of hindrance to her as she grew from a little girl and into a young woman. She could only now admit that even his harshest actions were done for her well-being.

\- - - - -

The young Taysha couldn't believe she had just been slapped by her father. In a flood of embarrassment and anger, she had run outside her parents' hut and into the cold night. Most of the people of the village were already sleeping and the central area was dark and empty. She held her hand over slapped face as she walked around cautiously checking for anyone who might see her. The cold night of early spring quickly reminded her she was wearing nothing but her light tunic and she instinctively headed back towards the family hut.

Instead of entering, she crouched outside at the back and listened to her mother and father talk in mumbles while she debated with herself whether or not to go in. In the end, she refused to give her father the satisfaction of her returning so soon. She thought of going to the Children's Camp that night where there were extra furs, but the spring thaws had already started flooding the river and it wasn't crossable.

So, she stayed where she was until she could stand the cold no longer. Then she ventured out to the village center where the main fire was still smouldering. She tried to get the fire started again as quietly as possible, knowing that if someone came out of his hut that night, he would probably yell at her for "playing" in the sacred fire place. It would only add to her embarrassment and most likely end with her being escorted back home.

Eventually, she got a modest fire going but she kept it low to avoid getting into too much trouble. Feeling warmer, she pushed herself back up against one of the half-logs around the fire and curled up on the ground to sleep. She awoke some time later as the shakes set in. Unable to control them and with the fire completely out, she wrapped her arms around herself and walked back to her hut. It was the scariest short walk of her young life. She had quite seriously thought she was dying.

"Mama, Papa..." she whispered as she entered. The hut was still dimly lit from the coals of the indoor fire. Her elder brother woke and saw it was her standing there shaking.

"Idiot." was the only pity she received from him before he rolled over to sleep. Her father sat up and rested his arms on his knees as her mother got out from the bed and stepped over to her. She put her hands on Taysha's shoulders.

"Oh, you... " she said with a mixture of both love and scorn before leading her to their sleeping-furs. Taysha's anger at her father dissipated as the warmth from his body chased the cold away and she slept soundly between her parents until morning. When she woke, everyone had already left for the day. She put her fur mantle over her summer tunic, put her winter pants on, grabbed her boots and stepped outside. Her father sat beside the door weaving twine into a rope. Their eyes locked and remembering her anger and embarrassment, Taysha instinctively looked away. The worst feeling was one of defeat for having returned to him in such a pathetic state.

Her father rose and stood beside her as she finished tying her boots.

"Come," he said, plainly without anger or rebuke.

" _Oh, wonderful day. Now I am led to the river to be slaughtered,"_ she thought sarcastically, referring to how Amazoi parents seemed to have serious talks with their children by the river; the place also used to slaughter animals. But she was surprised. Her father led her in the opposite direction from the river, away from the village, to the edge of the wide meadow to the east. When they reached a small clearing just outside the bramble fence, her father knelt down to tap the ground with the blade of his knife and started to speak.

"The cold that comes from the ground comes from Belok. He is the male god of the earth-cold. Brother to Goddess Uverta, brother to Torak that commands the rivers. He, like most gods, is mischievous and will seek you out, envious of the warmth of Tabita's fire that comes from you. As insects are drawn to light, so is the cold to you. But we have weapons against these spirits so do not fear them. They are no more dangerous than the beasts of the forest. They do what is in their nature as gods so we must use the trickery shown to us by the Goddess Uverbim to outwit them. To survive. Do not surrender to these things that seek to destroy us."

As he spoke, Taysha realized the previous night's troubles between them had been replaced by a need to defeat a common enemy. Had she not been so proud, she would have put her arms round his neck and held tight, but this was not her way. Instead, she could only allow her look of defence and anger to melt away as slightly as she learned.

She followed him to a mossy, fallen tree and received teachings from her father on how to make a proper shelter and a proper bed the Amazoi way. First pine branches were ripped from trees. "Never more than two or three from the same tree lest the spirit of the tree curse you," her father explained then added with a wink and a whisper, "unless the trees are out of sight from your shelter... Place them three deep next to a fallen log, then if possible, rest fallen branches or sticks on the log and pine boughs to cover it. Make it low to the ground. This makes for easy camouflage and contains body heat. Not high enough to sit in, just to sleep."

"This keeps us active," her father added, "And in slow, but constant action we warm ourselves and keep our senses clear. Never rush. Never sweat."

Taysha helped strip branches and tie together a roof. A lot of it she already knew but it was nice to have her father's thoughts added on to each task.

"Keep your fire away from your shelter. It will burn it in the blink of an eye and you with it." he warned as he took a big stride from the shelter to mark out where the fire would be.

Taysha already knew how to make fire. Every family had flints and knowledge of making burnt wood re-kindle. They were, after all, a tribe of potters. There was always fire somewhere. She didn't need instruction on this, she thought. The only reason she didn't make a larger fire last night is because she was afraid someone would yell at her. But her father didn't pull out his flint from his pouch. Instead, he produced three pieces of dried wood: two flat pieces, one with an indent, the other with a carved out centre that was blackened by flame. The third piece was a sturdy stick without bark.

"Make sure you always keep wood such as this with you. Even if it rains, you can find tinder under the bark."

To demonstrate, he pulled off the bark from a nearby log and grabbed a small handful of sinewy material from under it. He then motioned Taysha to help him collect wood as he spoke.

"Always prepare your fire before you start to make it. I've seen many a boy run madly around to find enough wood for their quickly dying fire. Fire is a living thing. It needs food to eat," he held up the piece of wood with a long split down the middle, "and air to breathe."

Taysha brought half an armful of medium-sized wood and dumped it in the pile her father had collected, then stood waiting for further instruction.

"Would that last you a night?" her father asked as he continued collecting. Taysha looked down at the pile thinking this was just instruction to light a fire. Was he seriously going to make her stay out there all night? Not that she would mind but the thought made her more earnest in her search for wood as she began bringing back larger pieces.

"Good. Good," her father said as he helped her. "Never dash madly about the forest for firewood. The act of collecting will keep you warm. Sweat is like burnt wood. It is warmth used and cannot not be reused and the cold adheres to it. Slow but continuous movement; this is key against the chills. Collect as much wood as you think is enough, then bring more. Always. So there are ambers to rekindle the fire when you awake."

Taysha found a half dead branch still connected to a fallen tree. It was broken on the bottom but still hung on to its parent tree. Taysha tried to stomp it off, but her foot bounced back up and she let out a little "Ouch!" He father had seen what she did and before she could walk away he approached her.

"Taysha, wait. Look here."

He stopped near a thicker branch that lay half in the dirt of the same fallen tree but the base was high enough to make a clear break.

"Lift your knee up, up to your chest before delivering the blow." He gave her an example and his branch only half broke on the first stomp but the second one separated it from the tree.

"Small kick, small power. Try again," he added with a nod to the branch she had not broken. Taysha could already feel the pain in her foot before she tried it and a whine crept up the back of her throat, but she knew a whine would invite a hail of rebuke and anger from her father. She didn't want to get slapped again. Still, she couldn't help show him as much discomfort as she dared when she walked back towards the branch. She brought her foot up higher than before and once again in bounced off.

"Ow!" she moaned and stepped back in a half limp with a scowl. Her father made such a quick movement towards her she instinctively raised her arms to defend herself against another slap.

Instead, he positioned himself over the thickest part of the tree and raised his leg as high as it would go, aiming his foot at the trunk. Taysha thought for an instant that he had gone crazy, thinking he could kick a tree in half. With an expulsion of air he brought his foot down hard on the trunk with such ferocity that the entire tree shook. Then he did it again in full force before turning to face Taysha who had stepped back instinctively out of fear, wondering what his purpose was.

"Look here, girl. Pain is a device of the gods to keep man in submission. You are too young to understand this now but soon you will become a mother yourself. Then you will know. It is our rebellion against the god's influence that allows men and women to live free. If you do not conquer fear and pain, your child will die in your belly, just as you will die in the cold." He stopped talking and straightened up as if he had realized he may have said too much.

"Try again. This time don't think about stopping at the branch. That's what you did last time. I could see it. That's why it didn't break and you felt pain and shame. Lift your foot high, drive it _through_ the branch and into the ground. Then you will feel an endurable pain and pride."

Taysha had mixed feelings about this 'endurable pain', but also held a curiosity as though she had been let in on a secret of life. She walked over to the branch and lifted her knee up as high as she could, lost her balance, stepped back on the side of a mossy log and fell on her ass.

"Cunts... " she swore with a quick look at her father, expecting a rebuke. But none came. Taysha picked herself up and steadied herself once more. Her knee lifted and she drove her foot straight down and into the dirt with a deep-throated yell that even surprised her. Just as her father said, she felt pain, but the pride that followed told her she had done more than simply broken a branch. She had learned a secret of breaking the mischief of the gods.

As she started picking up more wood her father turned and left her continue on her own. Over his shoulder he called back softly, "Mind your fire," he said drawing attention to the dying flames.

\- - - - -

"M _ind your fire."_

Taysha recalled her father's final instructions that day as she sat shivering by the river. She glanced back for signs of the Hoorg and then returned to watch the water flowing past.

"I can't remember what I did to cause him to strike me." she said out loud, her voice bringing her back to the present moment. She wanted so much just to stay huddled in a ball and rest but she knew better. She needed shelter, something to lie on, and a fire. All these things were back at the village, but she quickly put it out of her mind. She could picture the Hoorg boy with the bow waiting patiently for her return. She would not give him such satisfaction. She would live long enough to see the Great Waters then she would join her family and her people by her own hand. Not by the hand of a stinking Hoorg.

She got up and the sting from the cooling sweat hit her body. The soreness in her legs told her she had been sitting too long already. But the time to relive the past had shown her she needed to use her head if she wanted to survive. She hobbled across the river to find a place to make camp. Regardless of how easy it was to cross, somehow having the river between her and anyone who may still be after her put her mind at ease.

The opposite side of the mountain was steeper and had fewer trees. This made the undergrowth thicker and it took more time to move around. She didn't get far before she remembered a place she had just passed back up the mountain. The place she was thinking of was like the Children's Camp where the slope had given way to a cliff of sorts. A rock twice her height protruded from the side, creating a gap just high enough for her to crawl under. From the moss that covered it, it looked as if it had been there from the beginning of time. It should stay in place one more night. The problem was it was back where she came from. Not all that far – maybe five or six stonethrows away – but to turn around now would mean she had lost some sort of game with the gods at finding a place among the undergrowth.

She cursed her stubbornness as she kept pushing her way around in circles amongst the brush. The rocks and steep angle of the slope was making it difficult to find a decent place to spend the night and her steps became heavier. Eventually her fatigue became stronger than her desire to beat the gods at their game.

"Even if I find a place, I couldn't make fire here," she finally admitted, looking at the tightly packed bushes. There were just enough trees to keep out the sun but there was not enough cover from the rain. The ground was dampish too. With her face and hands covered in scratches, she finally stopped, looked up at the darkening blue sky and before a tear could form in her eye, she looked down at the ground once more.

" _Slow and continuous. Slow and continuous."_

Her father's words repeated in her head. She made up her mind to go back to the area with the rock outcrop. Stooping down to come back through the bushes, she spotted a firm, straight branch by her feet. It was about her height and was splintered at the end where it was still partially attached to its parent tree.

She tried to stomp and break it off but the fallen tree was too small to support such a blow and it simply bounced up and down. She then took hold of the half-fresh branch and grappled with the connected end, twisting and pulling. The tree did not want to lose a part of itself so easily.

After a hearty struggle it finally let go, sending Taysha backwards into a berry bush.

Victorious, she scrambled out and made her way back across the river using her new spear as support. It still had leaves and stray branches at the top but, they were mostly dead and she would work on it later that night, doubtful that she would be able to sleep. Heading towards the rock, she made a new rule of life to add to her collection of wisdom.

" _It is better to go back to what is known than to proceed ahead to what is unknown."_

This, she concluded, might lead to an argument about fear of discovery and the curiosity to explore so she changed it to: _"Safety lies in the familiar."_ Keeping it simple left the meaning vague and difficult to debate. Either way, she had no one to argue with now but herself.

At the rock, she stood shivering a moment as she realized she should have a knife. The boys all had knives. Real metal ones. The married women did as well. She knew fine metal was a rarity but still ... everyone in the village from child to elder should have a knife at least. She put the frustrating thought behind her. After all, it was too late to cry about it now.

Night was upon her and she had to get moving.

" _Slow and steady. Slow and steady,"_ she repeated in her mind as she piled stones around the base of the huge rock like a little wall. Her eyes had grown accustomed to the dark and could quite clearly see up the mountain and down to the stream. If anyone showed themselves, she could be down and across the river before they reached the little valley of fallen trees that lay between them.

She had no doubt the Hoorg were still after her and she wondered why they had not yet come into view. She didn't believe she could have outrun them. Most certainly her tracks were bare and easily followed. She had been running non-stop from late morning until night, something she had never done before or thought was even possible. She had reached a point where her lungs and heart were burning so badly, she thought she would just die. In fact, it was the hope that she would die that pressed her onwards. She envisioned the disappointed looks on the faces of her pursuers when they reached her lifeless body. Step after step she expected it to happen or an arrow find its mark in her back. But she did not die.

Now she stood alone without pursuers and she found the silence difficult to endure.

By the time she had collected the branches for her bedding, she was warm enough to take off her fur mantle. Now that the job was done, she realized something else. She hadn't eaten anything all day. She'd felt hungry since she was sitting at the Children's Camp but now she realized it was more than that. It was her period. She could feel it coming. Most likely that night.

Unable to move beyond tearing branches off for her bed, she curled up under the rock in the hopes she could sleep even just a little.

Alone in the dark, it was a half-dream of her Betrothed walking away from her that once again caused her eyes to fill with tears. It became so unbearable that Taysha had to promise herself she would not think of him, nor would his name ever leave her lips while she lived in this world. Instead, she thought more of her father. Although he was smiling in her imagination, he also seemed to look a little sad. Now that she thought about it, he had always looked that way.

Laying curled up in the pine boughs under her shelter, she wished she could show him how she used what he had taught her. Tears started to fill on the bridge of her nose and drop onto her arm that was her pillow for the night. Her thoughts then moved on to their family hut and all her belongings.

"The Hoorg must have it all now," she thought. This made her realize, as she thought of everything they could have taken, of how much she was lacking. She had no knife, no extra fur for sleeping or tunic or scarf, no flints, lace or twine. Not even extra loin cloths, or the _collectives_ she would soon need.

She pushed her hand into her pants to check. The blood hadn't started yet. The little bit of rest she had was enough for Taysha to think of the consequences of not preparing a _collective_ before the _red river_ started.

She pulled at the base of her tunic shirt to see if she could tear a piece off. If it could be done, it wouldn't be easy and if she did, she couldn't mend it. So, she left it alone and thought of other solutions.

Just let it run freely? No, it would attract wolves or bears, and it was messy and tickled. The fur from her shawl? No, it wouldn't absorb properly and it would make more mess than anything. Leaves? More for wiping shit than for collecting blood. It would have to be her tunic. The one made by her mother. She forced herself out from under her shelter and grabbed two rocks to use as a hammer and anvil to slice a section of cloth. She pulled off her tunic to make better work of it and quickly wrapped her shoulders with her fur mantle against the cold. Squatting over her makeshift tools, she checked herself again.

She just hoped the trip to the Great Water would only take a day or less so she wouldn't have to put up with it any more. She also hoped there were no monthly troubles in the After Life.

Having the cloth stripped and wrapped, she put her new _collective_ in place. She redressed and fastened the rope sash that held her tunic tight against her. The cold was slowly becoming unbearable and she shivered continuously. Eventually a fire would be necessary. She sat and tried not to move to conserve the heat but her shivering became uncontrollable. The work of her body to keep her warm was now working against her as every shudder brought in cold air with it.

She battled as long as she could but eventually decided that if someone evil was close enough to see the fire and came to attack her, it must be the will of the gods. It seemed she had foiled _their_ attempts at destroying all of her people so far. It only made sense that she would be able to continue doing so.

As Taysha started methodically collecting wood, she wondered why all of this was chosen to be. What council had taken place amongst the gods that they would sanction such an act? The unfairness of it all started her weeping once more. Eventually she forced her mind to focus on the only important thing at the moment; where she was going. The Great Water.

Wiping her nose on her arm, she readied the kindling to make a fire just as her father had taught her.

She had started many fires since then, but here in the cold wet of winter, this was her first true test. Through four broken fire-sticks, two split base wood pieces, a sliced thumb and a bruised hand, she persevered until the beginnings of a fire shyly appeared with a thin trail of smoke and small orange glow. For the first time that day, her tears were tears of joy. She felt the warmth successfully chase out the cold as she wrapped her arms around her knees and fed the struggling fire a handful of dried grass and bark strips.

Her stomach caught the smell of the fire and started grumbling for its meal. She had noticed mushrooms growing along the way during her escape, but had passed by them by, as out-running her pursuers was of higher priority than collecting snacks. She thought of walking back to find some but questioned her memory of whether they really were the type for eating. The temptation to risk it was diminished by her memory of a young man who had eaten the wrong type of mushroom just the year before. He did not die, but the moans of pain and constant smell of vomit that came from his hut remained clear in Taysha's mind and nose.

As she continued to feed the fire, she concluded that she would have to gather mushrooms and other edibles on the way during the day and eat them at night. She must continue doing so until she was caught or reached the Great Water. There would be little else to fill her stomach in the early winter months.
Her front warmed enough to take her fur cloak off and put it on her knees. She turned her back to the fire to sit awhile before she crawled back into her shelter.

One thing she was glad about was it was not the season for insects. She wouldn't have to worry about mosquito, or spiders, or tics, or mites, or fleas, or wasps. In fact the worst thing would be to find a mouse or other rodent had shared the heat of her nest. And they would be welcome visitors for her morning meal.

An image flashed through her head of when she and Kirsha were both napping in the girls' hut at the Children's Camp one summer. A bird simply flew in and perched on her friend's head.

"Taysha, Taysha," Kirsha whispered, "Don't move. Look. Look at this!"

Taysha was drifting off to sleep and the request not to move mixed with "Look at this" didn't help her much as she was curled up with her back to Kirsha. Taysha turned around just in time to see the startled bird take off.

The simple memory made her stomach feel all the more empty and her throat constricted once more with a sickening feeling of nostalgia and sorrow. She grabbed hold of an exposed root from the embankment in front of her and pulled herself up to her feet. Although in extreme pain, she was in fine shape considering what she had put her body through.

Her days of finding time to run off to the meadow to match strength and agility with the boys were rewarding her now. Running from point to point, throwing rocks or sticks at birds or other targets. Such games were not becoming for a girl-of-age, but they had given her an edge in physical ability. She could quite clearly see Kirsha or Tara faltering if they had run with her. They would have been caught and created a terrible dilemma for Taysha of whether to keep running or join them in their fate. In a cold moment in her heart, she allowed herself to be thankful they were not with her.

Yet her solitary existence was already playing tricks on her mind.

In her exhausted state, she had at one point started to believe that she was in fact the only one who had died that day and this was her hell: the Middle Lands. It was her punishment for questioning the gods. It would be night forever and cold forever, and she would be chased forever.

She could not escape, could not sleep, and could not eat.

Taysha also wondered if it would have just been better to be taken by the Hoorg. At least that way she would not be alone with the gods that whispered dread in her ears. It was better to be with those she knew among evil men than alone with evil gods. She called out quietly to her mother and father, her brother, and Kirsha. But they did not answer.

Taysha then turned to the Goddess Uverbim. The Mother of Life and All that Is.

Taysha was sure she could hear the Great Goddess tell her that she had been chosen. Above all others. But first she must stop thinking and just sleep. This too will pass. The sun will come again and free her from this torment of the gods. All Taysha could do now was wait for the Goddess to come and comfort her and lead her. She must be brave and patient until then.

She crawled back into the shelter and the warmth that remained in her nest of branches reached out and welcomed her. She lay staring blankly out of the entrance of the shelter with her hands folded under her cheek. From the corner of her eye she could see a scrape on her knuckle from earlier that day.

"I wonder how I did that." she thought, before drifting off to sleep.

\- - - - -
"Taysha, are you all right?" came the voice.

Taysha turned to see the young Hoorg man who had tried to kill her with the arrow.

" _Obviously he missed on purpose then,"_ she thought.

He was standing at the entrance to the Children's Camp looking into the girls' hut where she was lying. She noticed she was holding her father's knife, but it was so much smaller than she had remembered. It seemed to have shrunk to fit in the palm of her hand.

"This couldn't kill a rabbit," she thought, rather disappointed, as she turned her attention back to the young Hoorg.

"We have soup ready at the village." he said as he pointed with his left hand. She noticed he was holding her mother's disembodied head by the hair as he did so. In his right hand was the head of a stag which rested against his thigh as he held it by the antler. She thought it to be a deer anyway but it was much, much smaller than usual. It was more the size of a fox. Or maybe it was a fox, with antlers. It kept changing as she looked at it.

More peculiar was that the sight of her mother's head didn't bother her as much as one would expect. What really bothered her was the feeling she couldn't move from the hut. She was waiting for Kirsha, although she didn't know why exactly.

"I have to wait," she replied, "See, ask that bird. She'll tell you." Taysha pointed to a bird that was unmistakably the one that had landed on Kirsha's head those years before.

The bird was noticeably mad at Taysha. It looked at her with a frown that one wouldn't expect a bird could give. It started to say something that Taysha didn't catch, as her attention was drawn back to her mother's head. Her dead mother's eyes were now open and she said to Taysha quite calmly, "Hurry on now. This is all part of life. Not to worry. I'm sure Kirsha is eating her soup now. That naughty girl... leaving you alone like this. Tsk," she continued as her voice lowered and was replaced by the voice of the bird. Taysha's head turned to see it sitting quite close to her now, uncomfortably close, as the bird was still quite angry.

"She told you," the bird hissed in Taysha's language, "She said not to move. She told you! Not. To. Move. NOT TO MOVE!

But YOU DID! YOU MOVED!"

Its voice was becoming shrill and sounded a lot like Kirsha's. Taysha knew she could not get past this creature to the supposed safety of the Hoorg boy because it blocked her from leaving. It hopped closer onto a branch that was growing in the middle of the hut as its undecipherable squeaking became louder.

"RUN!" her mother's head suddenly screamed. "DON'T LET IT TOUCH YOU. RU....!"

Taysha awoke with a start. Once again her heart was trying to pound its way out of her body. She lay still, noticing the uncomfortable feeling of cold sweat on the back of her neck. She reached around to wipe it dry as she recalled the dream. She felt anger. She tried to remember the other two dreams that had woken her that night, but could not. Her only consolation was the faint hint of colour coming from the sun, somewhere behind the mountain, as it gradually returned the world of light. The sky through the trees gave promise of another clear day. That would mean very cold in the morning, a hot run during the day and cold again at night. This time she would be better prepared. The horror of her dream and the thought of being tracked made her want to move right away. The tightness of her muscles caused her to grimace as she forced herself up. There was no use sleeping. At least in running the mind is occupied. Sleep just opens the door for the gods to play their games.

She checked herself. Her period hadn't come yet. She wondered if it had just been cramps from running, from being hungry or from the loss of all she had ever known. She knew the monthly cycle could be altered by stressful times. _"Our monthly time comes to remind us to be at peace and rest,"_ These were the words given to her by an elder during her Coming of Age ceremony. But there was to be no rest for her now. To stop would mean giving herself to those who were probably still after her.

She kept her collective in place just in case, and gathered her newly made fire-starting set and tucked it in her sash. She would have to make a pouch, for foods and tools she would gather on the way, if she only had the material. For now, her sash would do. She added two stones for throwing while keeping an extra in her right hand and her makeshift spear in the other.

Taysha looked up through the trees to the peak of the next mountain. She wished she had asked her parents where they had originally come from. It might have been useful to know how they had travelled to the last village site of her people. That way she could have retraced their path to find those friendly to the Amazoi. Perhaps she could get food or furs.

She rebuked herself instantly. To do so would mean being alive another winter. No. This, her 14th Winter, would be her last on this earth.

With one last look for signs of her pursuers, she refocused on the distant peak that had hidden the setting sun the night before.

"At least my torment has been postponed."

She recalled the terrors of the night as the light from the sun slowly stretched across the sky. Then, lifting her hands slightly and closing her eyes, Taysha greeted the day in prayer.

"Feet on the Earth, Hands to the Sun, Spirit in the middle." She recited the Morning Prayer. Her eyes slowly opened as the realization hit her: she had no idea what the prayer meant. She knew it was related to one of the symbols most commonly used by her people. Shown as two circles within a larger circle divided by a line running from top to bottom through the middle. It was something she would have to think more about later.

She turned towards the west and repeated the Morning Prayer to herself once again as if the meaning would suddenly make itself known. It was just her and the Goddess now. They would run together and see what mischief the gods had laid out before them.

"The next boy to loose an arrow at me will meet my rock with his face." she swore to the sky in an attempt to convince the gods their fun was in vain.

The cold of the air, the pain in her body, and the hopelessness of her thoughts would soon converge upon her and render her useless if she stayed any longer. Though the forest was still dimly lit, she started on her journey. Using her spear as a staff, she gingerly head back down to the river, easing the pain out of her stiff legs little by little.
In the light of day, Taysha could see how the valley widened to her left. It made her feel vulnerable. Low in the tree line she couldn't see any smoke that might come from a village but there was the danger of happening across a hunting party. So she turned right and followed the river up the narrowing gorge, looking for food as she went. There wasn't much to collect on her way. The berries had all been eaten or had turned to seed, sleeping mice, frogs or snakes could not be dug out or found without taking time, and the steep incline of the river would surely not hold any fish. She mostly took grass that was still green to chew on and the bark that was used for medicine and stomach aches. She could find no edible mushrooms and cursed herself for not having taken those she saw when she had the chance. Though she crossed paths with a rabbit and squirrel, she had neither the tools nor the energy to catch them. At one point, as she was looking for a place to cross the river, she stood directly opposite a boar. In her tired and weakened state, there would have been a better chance of the boar eating her than the other way around. She stood watching him, knowing she had neither knife nor the capacity to convert such a large volume of meat to preserve and travel with. Her stares were met with a snort as it walked away without fear of the strange little beast on two legs.

"If I could have taken one thing, it would be bow and arrow." she whispered weakly to herself. She fantasized about smashing that cursed Hoorg boy in the face and taking his bow and arrows and using them gallantly against the other two men, saving Tara and her man.

Glancing up through the trees in the deep-cut valley, she could no longer see the peak of the mountain before her but it was no longer necessary. She knew she had to cross the river and go up eventually. She had to head west, not north. She had already wasted too much time travelling up the river and the desire to sit continued to invite her to the ground. But she stood fast, gripping her spear, and leaning forward to propel her onwards. Knowing there would be no water until she crossed the mountain in front of her she lay down for a final drink. As she did, her eye caught a glimmer. The sun had found its way to the pool just in front of her like the Goddess reaching forth and pointing with Her own beautiful hand.

A fish. No, two ... three fish lazily vying for position to catch the welcome ray of warmth in their gradually cooling domain. They were on the opposite side of the river, which Taysha could get to, but the embankment hung over too far and high to spear them directly from above.

Taysha stood up with a new surge of energy from the hope of food. Careful not to fall in the freezing water, she hopped over to a rock in the sun. There she took the supplies from her sash and placed them gingerly on the next rock. She then unwrapped her sash and held it between her knees as she took off her cumbersome fur mantle and her sweaty tunic. She had originally planned to place her tunic aside to dry and just wear the fur for warmth but the heat of the day's sun caressed her back and warmed her bones. She let herself stand for a breath or two until the original feeling of hunger reminded her of the task at hand.

"Still," she told herself, "this way my clothes won't get wet if I fall in."

She bent over to untie her rabbit-fur cuffs just above her boots and take her pants off. She laid them with her garments on the sunned rocks to warm. Then, quite carelessly, she tossed her fire starting set back onto her fur mantle, where they almost bounced into the quick current of the river.

"I'm going to have to stop doing stupid things or I'll kill myself by them." she scolded as she delicately put them in place.

Holding one end of her sash between her knees, she tied the other end to her spear. She calculated the length might not give her the distance she needed to spear a fish but the scarf would make it easier to retrieve. Looking back at the quickest flowing current just behind her, she reckoned the rocks would eventually stop the spear if it did get away on her.

"At least I'm thinking now." she commended herself as she turned to the fish. She noticed one had an eel attached to its side. She hated eels ever since she was but 5 or so Winters, when one of the stupid older boys told her they would swim up her vagina. For a long time afterwards she would only stand in the river up to her thighs as the other girls and boys swam about. She stopped tying as she remembered the boy. "Rafelti. Again..." she commented to herself, wondering why it was always a certain type of person who did certain types of things.

"You are such an idiot," she said aloud to the boy, hoping at least his spirit could hear her. She pulled tight on her knot to make sure it wouldn't slip and lined up her throw.

Splash!

The once clear pool of water turned to reflective ripples as the spear went straight into the mud on the other side. It was stuck, with her sash dancing in the water just out of her reach. Taysha stood there with her mouth open, half expecting the spear to work itself loose and float back to her but it didn't. It was held with grim determination by the combined efforts of Belok and Torak. Mischievous brother-gods mocking her.

In a wave of frustration this thought made her yell.

"Belok! You are the dirty cunt of the Earth! Let go! Let Go!"

She crouched instinctively as she cautiously scanned the river behind her and the mountain above.

"Idiot..." she whispered to herself.

It wasn't just the foolish notion of yelling when being hunted, she also knew screaming or crying would not help. Besides, the fish were trapped in their pool. They would have no escape until the melting of the snow.

Taysha looked at the opposite bank for a long stick but the cold blue shadows of the forest convinced her to try elsewhere first. She looked back to where she had first rested for her drink. A sandy bottom curved into a dip that separated the small pool where she had been drinking from the larger pool the fish were in. In between them was a narrow sandbar that she could stand on if she didn't mind getting wet shoes. She hopped back to the stones, remembering her practice games with the boys of trying to hit the stick with a rock.

"At least I'll be first to hit it this time," she encouraged herself. She collected her rocks, jumped back to her position, squinted her eyes against the sun's reflection, and threw. And threw again, and again, and again. Her arm was strong but the lack of food deprived her of accuracy and strength. For her troubles, the irony of life --or the help of the Goddess-- played in her favour. In the commotion of the rocks bombarding their once quiet sanctuary, the three fish zigged and zagged around the murky waters. Eventually one swam up over the shallows of the sandbar and into Taysha's clear little drinking pool.

Taysha was so focused on her goal that she had completely missed seeing it. It wasn't until the other two fish joined their brother that she noticed them. She also quickly noticed the small space was not to their liking. They looked quite ready to return to the chaotic, though familiar, surroundings of their home and one made the move to cross back over the barely submersed sandbar when it was met by the last rock from Taysha's hand. The water absorbed most of the power but stunned it enough so that it floated on its side. Taysha stood calculating both the distance from her meal and the pain level of the cold water. She realized time would be in the favour of the stunned fish. Soon it would have its wits about it and trying again for the deep murky calm on the other side of the sandy rise. She quickly glanced over for any remaining throwing rocks she could gather. The last few she had taken were mostly dug from the dirt. There was no time.

With a deep inhale, she leapt with all her strength, not taking her eyes off her prize from jump to landing, and dug straight into the icy water at her prey. The water bit back at the intrusion. The splash hitting her chest shortened her breath and she could feel her once warmed skin tighten. She had the fish round the middle and could feel it struggle and slip. If she tried to readjust her grip the fish would be gone and she could not bear to think what to do after that. As the cold of the water began stabbing her, she hoisted the fish straight out of the water and threw it towards the pile of rocks on the shore. In an instant of panic, she saw all the pools of water that she had never noticed before. Behind the fish, to its right, to its left. Some disappeared under huge rocks or back into the river flow. She stumbled forward through the icy water toward the fish and pinned it to the ground with her left hand. She scrabbled for a loose rock with her right hand and found a small stone suitable for the deed. She hit it on the side of the head twice. The crack of its skull told her she need not hit it any more. Besides, doing so would damage the eyes and brain, both edible and delicious when not full of crushed bone.

With a mixture of adrenaline, cold and the trauma of yesterday she sat shaking once again. She wanted to pick up the fish and bite into it but her shaking hands kept dropping the slimy creature.

She left it where it was and headed back to the warm rock to chase out the chills. It was big enough to lie down and curl up on, but the cold of the stone made her sit back up instantly and she sat wrapping her arms around her legs with her face towards the sun. Unfortunately, the winter sun was not the summer sun and she decided to stand up and move about. Still trembling, she took off the loin cloth she made last night to rinse out her collective, only to find her period had started. It looked as though it had started sometime during the rock throwing.

"A ... as... as the g ... g ... goddess wishes. So ... so shall it be. I th... thank you," she stammered as she rinsed out her collective and put the cold, wet material back in place.

Hunched over on all fours to warm her back, she moved only her eyes to her weapon still stuck in the mud.

"I'll have to get that shit spear," she reminded herself unhappily. If a large animal was drawn by the scent of the fish, or of her, she would be the next meal if she didn't have a weapon. The depressing thought that she would have to put eating aside a little longer made her sigh but she was quickly learning that she could not afford to make too many wrong decisions.

She jumped over to where her clothes were and put her tunic and fur mantle on. They felt a cold contrast to standing naked in the sun but they would quickly warm. She would also want to dry out her sash while the sun still hit the valley before tying it around her waist. She looked around for a fallen branch. Finding one with an adequate curve, she inched her way to the overhang to where she could reach the floating sash. Looking down in the gradually clearing pool, she could see smaller fish hiding as best they could in the shadows below her, looking as afraid and lonely as fish could look. For some unknown reason she seemed transfixed on the fish, thinking how she had just taken away their mother or father.

"Please don't come to my dreams. I'm so sorry," she said to them as she rested on her arm, "I'm so sorry."

The tears started welling again. In her head she jumped back and forth between the similarities of her fictional fish family and her own. They were probably a family of fish, or good friends at least. They would have had good, long lives together, never knowing danger had it not been for the will of the gods that brought Taysha there to kill them.

"At least you're not alone," she concluded and took the sash in her hands as she gently rocked her spear loose.

Taysha sat back on the mossy outcrop and started to wring out her sash. She decided this travel to the Great Waters would not be so hard now that she saw the pattern. In the morning she would climb the mountain, at midday she would make her way down to the next valley and the river that would most certainly be there. She would then spend the time to catch a fish or two, then eat and prepare for the next day and so on. Her only concern was wolves, bears, sickness and of course, men.

A little bird flew down to the sandy pool for a drink, ignoring the fish behind it. It reminded Taysha of the bird in her dream and made her shudder and dread the coming night. It was still midday so she would at least have half a day of peace before night came.

She forced herself up and made her way back to her fish. As she stopped on the stone in the sun, she noticed the shadows from the eastern trees already gone. Soon the western shadows would start to fill the valley. The position of the sun told her she had spent too much time at the river. She had to head west.

But first and foremost, she had to eat. She went back and picked up the cold fish, carrying it back to the sun spot, she laid her sash down beside her. She turned her back on the other fish as she ate. With no knife, and already feeling the tiredness creeping back, she simply bit at the sides of the fish until she had eaten to the ribs. She scooped out the eyes and ate them too. Not feeling much better, but at least not as hungry, she turned her gaze to the mountain.

The shadows had already begun to overtake her wet sash on the rock beside her. She grabbed her spear, wrapped her sash around the outside of her mantle and turned back towards the overhang. She hesitated as she looked at the two other fish in the smaller pool and struggled as to whether she should put them back in the bigger pool or leave them. The ridiculousness of the thought made her head hang as she scolded herself. She would quickly have to stop playing little-girl games if she truly wanted to make it the Water.

The climb required both hands and feet as she worked her way up loose gravel and through the underbrush.

The softness of the dying ferns and centuries of dead pine needles helped her footing, but did nothing to alleviate the pain that coursed through her body.

She continued climbing until later in the afternoon when her thirst and legs told her it was time to head parallel to the mountain and walk around its southern end. She battled with her mind in a constant attempt to convince herself this was no more difficult than yesterday's run and climb.

" _But yesterday there was fear that urged you on,"_ one part of her said. _"You haven't that now. In fact, you think of returning down to the wide valley. That valley will take you to the Hoorg. They will not be hard to find. Somewhere in the valley below are the last of your people and maybe someone from your family. They would have kept Kirsha alive, for sure. They would be relieved to see you."_

" _I would be beaten and raped,"_ the other side retorted.

"Beaten and raped ... beaten and raped," she closed the argument with herself out loud.

Eventually she stood on a flatter stretch of the mountain and stopped to look up at the sun through the trees. It hung in the sky far to the west. There was a wonderful view of the mountains around her. She wondered what the Great Water would look like without mountains. Even the lake she remembered from when she was very, very young had mountains behind it.

"Isn't the whole world just mountains? I wish to live in a place without them."

Her daydreams stopped as her stomach growled. She realized she had made another frightful mistake by not trying to collect the other two fish when she had the chance. She could hardly be blamed. Up to this day in her life, her food had been caught and prepared for her. She had never been hunting with the men, as the women of the tribe never did so. It was the men's job.

"Absolutely stupid," she said at that thought, "How am I supposed to know? How can I ... ?"

The dryness of her mouth stopped her talking. Her right ankle was becoming sore from walking at a constant angle. A bump on her arm that she had popped and scratched last night by the fire had become infected. It was red and swollen and bothered her every time her mantle rubbed against it.

From the clearing, she had a view of the mountain she had run around the day before and the wide valley below. She liked the small open space she stood on and named it _Taysha's Eye_. She looked back at the corner of the mountain from where she had come, which gave her one last opportunity to return. Just below that southern tip, somewhere in the wider valley, would be the remaining people of her tribe. Along with the comfort of being with them would be food and water and maybe a warm place to sleep. But there could also be the horrors of yesterday unless she got back to the Hoorg tribe before the rest of them did. Perhaps the Hoorg women would protect her.

It was the "perhaps" of this reasoning that didn't sit right with her. Taysha was alone. Her only choice was to continue with her plan. It was the guidance of the Goddess as spoken through the last words of her mother that convinced her she must run and continue running. Run until the Great Water.

Damn the gods. She knew the tempting was their work. She knew better now.

Far to the west, the wide flat valley narrowed into a deep gorge that seemed to head up the mountains rather than simply through them. It seemed as if the natural line it made pointed to the direction of the setting sun.

It became obvious it would be faster to travel straight along the valley floor than to hug the mountain edges.

Her earlier thought of wanting to live in a land without mountains now seemed misplaced. The idea of traversing the wide space made her feel as though she would be swimming from rock to rock in a very large lake. The openness down below gave her an uneasiness that accompanies unfamiliar settings. She decided to stay on her mountain as she had yesterday. In the morning she would make her way down to the valley and proceed as quickly as she could up to the gorge.

By the time she had begun to make her shelter, the first drops of rain began to fall through the trees. She took pine boughs and wove them into a makeshift hat that covered her from her head to her lower back. Her fur mantle would keep most of the rain away but she knew she couldn't afford to get wet at this point.

She was wise enough to put her collection of firewood under the fallen log next to her little hut and cover as much as she could with branches. The ancient trees above her provided adequate cover from the falling rains but after a time they were bypassed and the accumulation of the raindrops turned to large droplets that would eventually seek Taysha out and land in her ear or the back of her neck.

Before she slept she took some time to make a second collective so she could wash the first. She did so in a large puddle and left it out on a flat rock by her shelter.

It was a wet, cold, miserable night for her but, ironically, she welcomed the discomfort because it distracted her from other thoughts.

Though physically harder to endure, emotionally, it was a better night than the last. The water would at least give her a drink in the morning and help to wash her collective.

Fatigued beyond her worries, the rhythm of the rain eventually lulled her to sleep.

\- - - - -
"Hrmph!"

The snort made her think she was sleeping in her mother and father's bed. The noise was obviously from her father, snoring in his sleep again as usual.

"He must be dreaming," she thought before the memory of what had happened in the last two days reminded her where she was. Fear slowly crept into her mind and her breathing increased. She lay perfectly still with her eyes shut tight. Her ears strained to give her the information she needed.

Perhaps she had been dreaming. It could have been a sound from her dreams that woke her. It had happened before. She would sit up during the night and listen to hear the sound again but there was no repeat of whatever it was that woke her. Someone was laughing or yelling, or a friend had called her name in her head.

This was probably just like those times. She could hear the rain clearly now. It was falling harder than before. Her right buttock was wet and she figured a puddle had formed where she was lying. Her heart was pounding from the sudden awakening. She could hear the thumping of her heart in her ears. And she could hear something else. Movement. Something stirring close by. Like the sound of a stick being moved back and forth on the ground. She shut her eyes more tightly and her body involuntarily closed into itself, trying to make herself as small as possible. Her mind raced to the stories of goblins and other terrors. The half-man and half-beast that ate children. She tried to erase the picture in her mind of a naked, deformed man-beast that crouched outside her shelter playing with a stick as he stared at her. Moving ever closer to touch her.

"Hrmph!"

This time she heard it clear and loud. It was close enough feel the vibration of the low sound. Her eyes flew open as she screamed. What greeted her consciousness was the face of a very surprised wolf. Its eyes were wide as it called on all its power to spring away from this most unexpected attack from the sleeping creature it had come to inspect.

Filled with her sudden fear, Taysha grabbed her spear as she leapt straight up, pushing her shelter up and off her with her head. She screamed out every breath, only to fill her lungs enough to scream again.

The wolf stood stunned for an instant as it stared wide-eyed at this beast breaking out from its hiding place, then it turned and leapt to the safety of the darkness.

All the while Taysha rampaged, yelling and screaming and hitting her spear in all directions on trees and bushes. Thinking she was being attacked by a pack of wolves, her heart was almost tearing through her chest. When she finally got to the point she needed to breathe more than scream, she tried to focus on the shadows all around her and spun on her heels, ready for an attack from every side.

"AArraah! AAaaaAAhh! WA! WAaaa!" she yelled at every suspicious shadow. Her legs started to tremble as the terror coursed through her body. She desperately had to pee.

The expected attack never came. It had been a lone wolf. More enjoyment of the gods.

"Ha!" she mocked in a loud voice intended for the gods and for any wolves that might be out there, "Ha! Ha! ... Shit Eaters!!" she yelled and stood panting, trying to decide if she should sit down before her legs gave out on her. Yet she stood cursing the darkness and the wolves and the gods and the rain that fell on and about her. Her shelter was in a heap. She could see by the shiny reflection of the water among the pile of pine bows that she had indeed been sleeping in a puddle. The cold was now adding to the mental strain of being suddenly woken. She just wanted to eat and sleep warm, and for all this to end. Her eyes grew accustomed to the darkness and helped chase back the shadows a little farther from her than when she had first awoken. She went over to the pile that was her shelter and took out her woven branch hat and cloak that would help a bit. She checked herself below. There was dried blood everywhere. Her collective had come loose some time in the night and sat at the bottom of her pant leg.

"Stupid of me," she whispered, "I know better than this."

She put the puddle that was her bed to good use and washed herself as best she could. She knew she shouldn't stay there. Though in all consideration it didn't much matter, really. She could be tracked no matter where she went. She thought about sleeping in a tree but wasn't keen on the idea of waking up on her head.

She decided to make a fire under the log where she had stored her firewood. She must warm herself and stop shaking, then move on down the mountain to find breakfast. At least by then it should be morning.

As she readied her fire, she considered her plan of walking through the large valley. It would indeed make for easier movement. She could cover three times the distance than she was covering now. Her leg muscles hurt. Her ankle was sore. Her feelings of hopelessness compounded with her recent shock brought her to gag. Feeling physically ill, she dry vomited as tears began to flow and the shaking increased. Through the blur of her crying she tried desperately to focus on starting that damned fire.

When she had finally got the fire going, her body relaxed to a degree she could control it again. She had completely forgotten about the rocks during her visit from the wolf and had since gathered three and placed them next to her. After all of this, it was still night and the rain kept falling hard.

She kept her wet side towards the fire. It was still better to be wet and warm, than wet and cold. Her sash, which was wetter than yesterday, hung from under the log near the fire. She was determined to at least dry that out. She could feel sleep catching her again, but she didn't want to give any chances the gods were watching... waiting.

Even though it was still dark, she could make her way around if absolutely necessary, but she would have to kill the fire and let her eyes get used to the dark before moving in the pouring rain. That was a hard thing to do. She knew the cold was just waiting for the fire to go out.

She took off her boots and smelled inside. They stank but it was not an unhealthy stink. The thick leather and overlay stitching had kept her feet dry from the elements but the sweat from two days of running and exertion would need to be dried out. Turning towards the fire, she propped her feet up on a pile of wood so the warmth would dry the soles. She pulled her throwing-rocks over to her side, and lay back with her fingers across her chest.

"I should have done this yesterday," she murmured softly.

\- - - - -

Taysha awoke with a start and propped herself up on her elbow. The initial shock was mostly just from realizing she had fallen asleep. She had been having a nice dream. She had been lying in the furs with her Betrothed. They were naked in her family's hut. Although her mother was cooking soup on the fire beside them, Taysha felt strangely at peace. She wasn't worried about her mother scolding her or her father or brother coming in. The two of them had been talking about something that she could not now remember but she remembered the feeling. It was a good, calming feeling, like a great truth had been spoken between them.

Now she lay in silence staring at the slow burning fire as the rain fell on both sides of her log shelter. Although it was still dark, the height of the flames told her she had been asleep quite a while. She felt surprisingly refreshed though sad, most likely because of the dream.

"Maybe he came to encourage me," she thought, "Maybe mother didn't say anything because she knew she didn't need to. She was always wise like that."

Taysha felt her damp sash. The outsides of her boots were warm but the insides cold and wet.

The retreating heat of the dying fire indicated it was time to move on. She instinctively looked up towards the sky to gauge the time, but quickly looked back down with a sigh. The biggest reason Taysha hated cloudy skies was that there was no way to tell how much time had passed. She thought this was what the afterlife would be like – constant sleeping and waking without end. The thought bothered her sometimes.

She put on her boots and kicked the fire out from under the log. The burning pieces scattered around, sizzling and struggling to stay alive in the falling drops of water. The fish she had yesterday had run its course. She went and squatted beside another pool that had formed nearby to relieve herself, washing herself by hand in the pool of water. The stool was mostly liquid.

Taysha knew it wasn't a good sign in terms of her health but standing in the night rain, her health wasn't her main concern at the moment.

She picked up her spear and rocks, and went over to get her first collective but it wasn't there. At first she thought it had blown off the rock but then she realized what had happened.

At the time, all she had seen was a pack of attacking wolves but now she could clearly remember seeing the lone wolf take it before it ran off.

"Shit Eater! SHIT EATER WOLF!" she yelled in the direction it had gone earlier that night. She hung her head and held the torn end of her precious tunic that was already stripped up to her hips. She remembered her mother making it for her and a rage swept over her.

"Dirty cunt! Cock!" she swore at the sky, blinking as the rain hit her eyes. With any luck, and favour from the Goddess, she would be dead before long. She couldn't take much more of this. She shook her head in disbelief in her ever-growing despair.

Her ankle really hurt now. Her spear would be more use as a walking stick than protecting herself. She breathed in heavily and turned her face towards the sky, this time closing her eyes and letting the rain hit her face for a while.

A long, steady sigh escaped her lips.

" _In any case,"_ she thought, _"it could have been worse."_

A pack of wolves. A bear. Or the lone wolf could have decided to take a bite of her face before she awoke. It could always be worse, it seemed.

She turned west, and started down the steep side of the mountain towards the narrow valley from where she would feel more comfortable entering the large, flat valley. The hike down the mountain strained her legs to the point of the muscles on her shins starting to hurt. The constant angle she was on forced her to use muscles that never seemed to have been used before. With nowhere dry to sit, she rested leaning on her staff or hugging a tree. At one point the pain started to bring tears to her eyes and she even tried walking down backwards for a few steps.

She had had quite enough of all this. It was only her second day and she was already crying from the pain. How did the men do this? Days and days of hunting and then bringing back stones-weight of meat on their backs. Over mountains, across rivers. If they had ever bothered to take Taysha along, she would have been used to it by now. She knew it wasn't just because they were male that they could endure such things.

She knew this from watching the young men who where taken on their first hunt. They would return to the village pale and quiet and looking as though they were in much pain.

None of them were required to carry back the meat on their first hunt or, for some, not even their second or third. On the day they did, they would stumble into the village with a deer or boar, once again exhausted. But, their eyes would shine. They would shine as if they had accomplished a great task, as though they had passed some great test only by their determination to do so.

This thought helped Taysha to press on, only in her case, she did not have her brothers or sisters to encourage her, not physically anyway. She could hear them in her head, from her closest friends and family to the others in the tribe whom she couldn't even remember by name. They all encouraged her to continue and to see the Great Water for them all. Her success would be the revenge and victory of all the Amazoi against the gods and their games of torment.

At least now the daylight had started creeping in through the trees. Although there would be no sun that day, Taysha felt better about being at the night's end. She made her way down to the ravine, limping and resting as she went. The terrain was jagged and rocky at the base and it was cold. It was colder in the ravine that morning than on the mountainside at night. She wanted badly to rest but the discomfort kept her moving onward. When she had gotten about a stone's throw from the mountain ahead of her, she stopped and strained her ears for the sound of running water. The thing making her nervous was that there was no sound of a river. She knew a single turn in a mountain could block any sound, but she was standing directly between the two mountains. She could almost touch the branches of the trees on each side.

If there was a river, she would have been standing in it.

The struggle to the ravine bottom had been slow going and her head started hurting. She stopped moving and sat on a wet rock and nursed her ankle. At her feet a dribble of rainwater about the width of her finger ran past. She thought again of the wide valley floor. The ravine she was in would lead to there.

It would also lead these countless little trails of rainwater which would connect with a river somewhere in the valley. She would also then be off the slope of the mountain and on level ground.

Taysha checked the sore on her arm. It had gotten bigger from rubbing on her soaking wet mantle. She had even more scratches and cuts from bushes, branches, and brambles.

The pain of her right ankle was now throbbing and it seemed to have transferred to her left. The rain beat down on her, dripping water down the holes in her makeshift head covering. She turned only her eyes to look south down the ravine. The mists from the rain in the valley made a sea of cloud below her. And there she sat, watching the vapours of the mist dance and swirl. Not even the cold would move her now. Even with the shakes and her ass numbing on the rock it was if she sat without a single thought passing through her mind.

She had to pee. She thought of just doing it as she sat on the rock, but remembered her mother scolding her for sitting in her pee before she was even old enough to fully speak. _"Funny,"_ she thought as she slowly slid off the rock into a squatting position, _"Funny how memories like that are carried with us ... I wonder if grandmother scolded mother for doing the same thing when she was a child."_

She undid the wet rope that held up her pants and pulled them up to her knees. Her collective would need washing soon, she noticed. It was the final thought that convinced her the decision to head for the lower valley was the best one. Her business done, and the squatting hurting her legs, she mustered enough energy to stand. She half pushed, half pulled herself back up to the rock as she pulled up her pants. She held her spear pinched between her chin and shoulder as she stood wobbling and tying the waist-rope slowly before forcing herself to take the first step.

Taysha cursed every breath she had to take towards the valley. Eventually she came to an overhang that she could sit underneath on dry ground. She decided she would rest there a bit before she carried on. Sitting on a flat rock with her elbows on her knees, she stared blankly at the ground.

A brief movement in the direction of where she had just come down from caught her eye and she turned slightly to look.

What greeted her sent her nose and eyes running in fear and misery. It was a wolf. The wolf from the previous night most likely, sniffing the ground around the trees Taysha had walked by. Taysha gripped her spear to support her weight, ready to leap to her feet.

Apart from her heartbeat increasing slightly, Taysha was too fatigued to feel the intense panic she had felt at their first meeting. She noticed it in herself. She realized her situation was dire. She had no trees nearby to climb, no escape, no energy to fight. Perhaps this was what happens when one accepts her imminent death. Maybe this is the calm her mother felt.

The he-wolf didn't notice Taysha right away. When it had determined the direction that she had gone, it started mapping out the jumps from rock to rock it would have to take to continue. At the final point it noticed the bush on the rock ahead was not a bush at all; it was the screaming creature with the stick from the night. The realization mixed with the surprising experience from last night startled it once again as it sprung back, loaded and ready to run again. But the creature before it didn't move. He could see it looking at him. It was alive. A human. Hiding under furs. Another ambush? He scanned around the trees for others but could not catch sight or scent of them. The small human sat watching his hesitation.

"You can kill me if you want!" Taysha's voice cracked as she yelled at him, "I don't care anymore!"

The sounds of her voice noticeably unnerved the wolf. It rocked back and forth as it sniffed the air for a trap. This two legged creature seemed too comfortable, too confident for his liking. There was something not natural about it. The secret to a lone wolf's long survival is not to make mistakes. Don't fight packs. Don't fight bears. Don't fight things that aren't scared or don't run. This was definitely one of the latter.

He checked behind the way he came down. Figuring this was his safest choice, he turned and dashed up the mountain leaving Taysha with her mouth half open in wonder.

The water dripping from Taysha's hat onto her eyelids made her blink and come out of her trance.

It was time to move.

She leaned forward on her spear until her body weight propelled her up and forward. She climbed over the rocks and up to the next dirty slope to where she could look safely for the wolf. It was nowhere in sight but she figured it was watching her from somewhere above eye level. She really didn't care that much anymore and she started to head down the cliff face towards the valley below. She was still above the trees of the wide valley and by the slow speed of her descent she knew it would be dusk by the time she reached the bottom. The only thing she could do was keep going. Over rocks, up and down gorges and side ravines, around trees and through brush, as the rain mercilessly soaked her and chilled her to the bone.

The rest of her journey down was painful, yet uneventful. Her tears, mixed with the rain, came and went in spells so often she herself couldn't tell if she was crying or not. The sore on her arm was raw and both her ankles were swollen by the time she reached the valley floor.

It had become intensely cold.

Looking up behind her at the mountain she had just come down, she noted she must have covered less distance that day than either of the first two days. She felt she had been walking through the ravine all her life. Once again she questioned if she had been killed and this was her afterlife. Would she constantly feel cold and hungry and constantly be driven to the Great Water? She didn't even know where it was or how far it was, if it even existed. There in the valley she could undoubtedly walk back to her village in a little over a day's time but she kept facing the direction she felt west to be. It was the lightest area of the sky, though it was hard to be sure through the darkened clouds. As long as the mountains she came down were either behind her or to her right, she would be fine.

More importantly, she was hungry, cold and wet. Even her firestarter set was as wet as the wood on the ground but she kept it in her tunic, knowing it would eventually dry out. In the meantime, she would have to press on, straight across the valley until she found a river to follow.

She found that being in the flat area wasn't as unnerving as she had first imagined. The trees around her made for adequate cover and the level ground relieved much of the strain on her legs, especially the muscles of her shins and lower back. The realization had Taysha imagining herself as an old woman.

"Maybe I am ..." she voiced her constant thought of being dead already. Perhaps she had really died years ago and now she was an old woman, destined to wander the wilderness. She would have to look at her reflection in a pool when the rain stopped. If it ever did.

A thick growth of fir trees caught her eye. It looked like a good place to rest. Maybe she could find some dry wood underneath. She limped over to see it was used by a family of deer by the looks of the old dung surrounding the grove. The first thing she noticed when she entered the enclosed area of pines was the lack of wind. She couldn't remember when the wind had started blowing. Now, at least, she was a lesser kind of cold.

Inside the huddled trees Taysha could stand comfortably. It made her think of the Children's Camp. It was darker inside and by the look of the old brown branches around her, not much light ever got in. The rain didn't fall directly in the grove but ran and trickled its way in from above. Any branches she could use for shelter or warmth were already wetter than her tunic. The ground was spongy but not from the wet. It was covered in lifetimes' worth of pine needles with the odd tuft of light brown grass. The only thing alive was a colony of moss growing from a rotting log that formed a sort of back-wall of the den.

She grabbed a few fallen branches and the moss and crawled over to the largest of the firs. She was happy to see there was no water running down its trunk and no sap on the bark. She lined up the branches in a row at the base like a small table and shook the water that had attached to the surface of the moss. She put the moss on the sticks and sat down on her new chair. Her head dropped to her chest almost immediately though her mind told her she would have to get to water. To drink. To find fish. To clean her collective. The latter playing on her mind as an unnecessary extra hardship for women.

" _That's so stupid,"_ she thought to herself, picturing the women of her village doing their daily chores, whether or not it was _that_ time, _"How are we expected to work and behave like nothing's happening? It hurts. It's messy. It's embarrassing. Women should have the right to do nothing during that time of the month. Just sit. If I were the chief, that's what I would decree."_

Her eyes opened at the thought and she answered herself wearily, "I guess I am the tribe leader now."

She straightened up and let the tree take the weight off her back and head as she lay back and closed her eyes.

A snort from her own throat woke her up from a deep sleep, followed by the familiar shivers of waking in the cold of night. She tried to get up from her seat but couldn't move her legs. They had quite clearly decided to ignore her commands to move any farther. Under normal conditions she would have agreed with them but the onset of cold forced her to roll over on her side to try to stretch her muscles out before attempting to stand. The pain brought her dirtied hands to her mouth to stifle herself from yelling.

"Ow ... ow, ow, ow, ow, ow-ow," she moaned, working at her legs as she lay trembling in the pine needles.

It wasn't completely dark yet. Outside the covering of trees was the remaining light of day. It was also raining as hard as it had been that morning. Any semblance of heat that had accumulated in her tunic and mantle had dispersed as soon as she rolled over. The fresh flow of blood sent the feeling of ants up and down her legs.

As she sat rubbing out the pain, she noticed the lighter colour of the pine needles which her feet had kicked up while she had moved around to loosen up. The lighter color indicated it was dry. She rolled onto her stomach and clawed at the ground in front of her. There it was; dry pine needles about a finger's depth from the top. She breathed out in relief and gave a little laugh as she dug deeper into the soft pine needle floor. It went deeper and deeper, almost up to her elbow before the light coloured brown needles started turning dark black from decay. Knowing what she could do, she rolled over on her back in relief as she continued to stretch her legs and back.
Her hunger was ever present but her desire to sleep was overwhelming all other discomforts. She was finally able to force herself up and lightly hop up and down to relax her legs and shoulders. Her swollen ankles prevented her from warming herself fully so she gingerly knelt down on the carpet of pine needles and started by scraping the wet top layer off to the side. She made an oval area large enough where she could fit inside with legs fully extended. She then continued to push up the sides towards the middle high enough where she could pull them in over her to protect her from the rain and, hopefully, more nosey animals.

Taysha took off her handmade pine branch poncho and set it up where her head would go. She noticed it would probably end up dripping more water on her than if she didn't use it, but the idea of a buffer between her sleeping face and the teeth of a wolf convinced her to keep it where it was.

The movement had warmed her legs enough to get the job done but the pain from the tendons and joints would not go away. Her head still hurt and though she couldn't clearly see the scrape on her arm, she could feel it starting to itch.

"Don't scratch," her mother would say when Taysha was young, but she would scratch anyway and it would always get worse. It was never to the point of having to burn it clean but bad enough to teach her what happened when she scratched. There were no medicinal herbs alive so late in the season and there wouldn't be until the spring.

Taysha took one look at her bed before climbing in and couldn't help noticing it looked like a burial hole. The thought of her eventual death made her stop and think. She would never know her own children or her grandchildren. She would never experience the Sacred Trip of a Woman during sex, the Trip that changed physical love from "interesting" to "indescribable."

Taysha sighed. She decided that apart from those few things, she hadn't really missed a lot.

The pine needles pricked her lightly as she covered herself as best she could. As she closed her eyes, she told herself to shit in the morning before she become even more sick.

\- - - - -
The morning grey through the rain clouds was a welcome sight after having woken on and off throughout the night. The fear started to lessen with the coming of the light as she lay content in the safety and warmth of her pine-needle bed. As far as she could tell, the rain hadn't stopped all night. The top of the pine needles was wet but it had only seeped through in a few spots. Her tunic, shoes and mantle were a mixture of warmth and wet. If it had been summer, she would have taken everything off and bundled it on her back as she walked barefoot.

She rolled cautiously onto her side letting her legs stretch out until she shivered. She pulled her arm out of the needles to look at her sore. A headache greeted her soon after, reminding her to find water and something to eat. Rasping in short breaths, she made herself stand and walk in the direction she thought a river should be. Somewhere ahead in the forest, before the next mountain started, there had to be one.

Wiping the hair from her eyes, she realized her face was blemished. With no one around to see, let alone clean it for her, she simply scratched off and squished out two of the most painful of them. She soon noticed her throat was feeling funny. Almost hurting. She thought it must of been from breathing in the mouldy needles all night.

"This is what it is to die," she reasoned, "So fast ... I didn't know it would come so fast. A gift from the Goddess to end my suffering."

Even at this conclusion, Taysha didn't just sit to wait for the end. It was actually the hunger that was in turn feeding her will to continue. She always liked to eat, a point constantly noticed by the elder women as they commented openly on her favoured conditions for bearing children. To her, they had always made it seem they were making more a show of their great knowledge than actually giving Taysha a compliment. This was one of the many reasons she resented the elder women. She liked it better when the boys or men would give a look in her direction.

Especially when they bathed.

They would look and say something quietly amongst themselves with tell-tale smiles.

Taysha didn't like the odd bit of laughter so much, and she never asked exactly what they said about her. She didn't need to. She and her friends did the same about every boy and man in the village, especially about Fulan, a man of 20 or so Winters. He was a simpleton. A simpleton with the largest cock any man or woman had ever seen.

"He fought bravely, I'm sure."

Taysha suddenly found herself stopping at this image of him during the Hoorg attack. She envisioned the simple man would have fought wildly, slashing this way and that with his axe. But, the Hoorg would have defeated him by using their intellect. Circling him like wolves. The spirit beats the flesh. Thought and patience over strength.

With these two weapons of the mind, maybe even Taysha could kill all the Hoorg. One at a time.

"Hmph," she exhaled in an attempt to mock herself and her fantasy, "Perhaps in the Afterlife."

The constant grip on her spear had turned her wet hand wrinkled and white, hardly something she was worried about at this point. Even so, she changed hands from time to time. She cursed herself for not having come down to the valley a day earlier. She would have made five times the distance without swollen ankles and cramping legs, and perhaps even found a river and food a day earlier.

Every thought that went through her head at this point were like flashes of lightning in the daytime, brief and almost unnoticeable. It was all she could do to keep putting one foot in front of the other. She looked down at the wet forest floor just ahead of her as water dripped off her makeshift hat in front of her eyes. She would know where the river was when she stepped in it. This was almost the case when she finally found it.

The river had carved into a soft fresh bank which left it concealed in low brush. Taysha's limp actually saved her from tumbling face forward into a much wider river than she had expected. Her fatigue and the rain on her poncho had drowned the sound of the huge river until she was almost in it. The open space of the valley dispersed the river's chatter much more than what she was used to in the narrow valleys.

For some reason, the speed of the current made her heart sink. She remembered when she was very young, about 5 or 6 Winters, before her tribe had settled. They were at a river like this ... perhaps this was the river. Maybe this is the way they had come. She did remember following a large river. Her mother and village elders would constantly yell at all the children for being too close to it. At that time, she thought of nothing more than the uncomfortable feeling of being yelled at. She and her friends would scamper back up into the bush away from the wrath of the adults rather than from fear of the river. Now at this age, she could see the inherent danger lying before her. If she fell in, there would be a good chance she would be carried off and drowned.

If there were fish in this river, she couldn't see them. In fact, her first impression of such a large river was that all the fish would be carried away to the end if they didn't find safety in one of the side currents.

The river was flowing from the direction of the Great Water in the west, and down towards the lands of the Hoorg in the east. The mountains upstream to her right rose up through the mist, higher than those she had travelled around. She could see they were far off but they would be easier to reach now she was on somewhat level ground. Beyond them must lie the Great Water and her departure from this world.

She slid gently down the gravel bank to the river edge and drank the rain-swollen, dirty water until her head hurt from the cold. It lessened the discomfort from the thirst but did nothing for her empty stomach. She looked around her for moss or river-snails or small pools for fish but saw none. A small tuft of grass that was still green was hanging from the embankment she had just slid down. She decided to take it when she climbed back up the ledge.

She could at least wash herself a bit before then. She crouched as well as she could just out of the side current, using two rocks for balance. The nasty shock of cold on one of the few remaining warm parts of her body prompted her to finish quickly. She scooped water in her hand two or three times and wiped between her legs. It was the best she could do. It was more than she felt like doing, and she quickly pulled her pants up to tie.

She was thinking more of the grass on the bank now, and wanted to start moving before she let her tiredness convince her to just sit. To sit would mean to be cold. To sit here would mean to starve. She would just have to push herself a little farther. The rain wouldn't last forever. She would then be far enough away to light a fire safely and, next time, she would catch all the fish she could carry and take her chances with the wolves and bears. She decided if she had five or six fish and was confronted by a wolf, she would just throw it a fish and get away.

She stood and inhaled deeply. Her infected arm rubbed uncomfortably against the fabric of her tunic and she pulled it aside to look at it. The rash was getting bigger. It was itchy. She took some clay-dirt from beside the running water and smeared it on her arm. She didn't know why she did it but it seemed the right thing to do.

There had been no time to recoup or rest. She thought it funny that in order to find a place to rest, to get warm and to eat, she would have to endure fatigue, cold and hunger. Such was the ways of things. What else could be done?

The little climb back up the river bank reminded her body of the stress endured by her three-day journey along the mountain slopes. She focused her eyes on the green grass just hanging from the top. She would have to stretch up and to the side to pull it to her. Balancing on one of the loose stones, she pushed up on her toes to reach for it.

It was then the sudden appearance of the wolf's head right above her made her hand snap back so quickly it sent her reeling backwards.

Her tired legs gave out and she threw her right hand behind her to brace her fall, only there was no ground where it should have been. Her hand landed on a smooth stone with the full weight of the fall. Pain from her wrist shot to the base of her neck like an intense burn. She pulled up her arm to her chest and cradled it with her left hand as the momentum of her fall rolled her over dirt and stone. She had landed on the side of her ass with a bump and her spear had fallen further behind her, just out of reach on the stony river bed. Her head-dress had become a small scattering of branches that lay beneath and behind her.

Tears of pain and fear clouded her eyes as she scrambled up, expecting to feel the weight of the beast as it fell upon her. She wondered where the damn animal had been last night when she was sleeping. She wondered if it was the same wolf from the mountains. Then she wondered if it had brought help.

Taysha had seen the dogs at the village attack a boar that had unwittingly walked down the village river. They were cunning and would wait until the animal was looking away from them before attacking from behind. The memory of the boar that had been torn apart by the dogs made her sit up the moment she had stopped falling. She wasn't going to let the wolves do the same thing to her. She leaned on her left side cradling her right arm to her chest as her left hand scrambled to find a loose rock. Her shoulders were hunched and neck and head pulled down into herself in anticipation of the first bite. She shot a quick look towards the bank half expecting the wolf's head to be even closer this time, but there was nothing.

Wide-eyed and with clenched jaw, her hand froze on the rock as she looked up and down, left and right along the ridge above her. No wolf. No wolves.

She was sure it was the wolf from the last two days. In her mind, Taysha recalled the ridiculously startled look on the stupid animal's face.

It was the same look she remembered it had the other two encounters. Pulling its body back. It looked so funny she couldn't help but laugh.

" _Stupid animal,"_ she thought.

"Ha! Hahaha!" she laughed, as the pain repeatedly shot up from her wrist.

"Stupid!" she yelled, "Stupid Maggot! Cunt! Puke! Snotnosed-shitdog!"

The curses became laughter, which became crying, which became laughter once more. Her racing heart and deep breathing helped to clear her mind. That, along with the idea of this scaredy-bird, useless baby-dog-wolf that was so obviously waiting for her to die so it could come and eat her quietly. Taysha wouldn't allow that to happen. She decided she wasn't that far gone.

Not yet, at least.

Taysha tried to lift up her make-shift poncho but she was sitting on most of it and she could tell it was in pieces. It wasn't really helping anyway. She rolled herself towards the bank to help get up and reached down to pick up the spear. It would have been faster if she had just taken a step to get it but that would have broken her fragile decision to carry on. It was just out of reach. She couldn't pick it up. This one little task seemed so big at this moment. Taking that extra step down to pick it up would be like admitting she had been beaten.

If one were to ask her what she had been beaten at; what game? Against who? She probably couldn't answer.

Against herself? Against the gods? She didn't know. All she knew was that she was so tempted to leave it. But, it was one of the few things she had left. She had just abandoned her homemade poncho. She had accepted the fresh pulses of pain that coursed through her wrist and shoulder. If nothing else, she would at least have the satisfaction of picking up that shit-spear without stepping down off that shit-rock.

She swung around and lowered her right leg to the level where the spear lay. Her bruised ass started to throb. She took another look up at the top of the bank to make sure the wolf hadn't come back before she let her foot down and hook what would now become her crutch. The pressure of the blood in her right wrist was too much to leave hanging by her side, so she carefully tucked it in her sash across her stomach as she gingerly lifted up the spear with her foot so she could grab it. Rolling back to the most comfortable position, she lay for a moment as the rain hit her face gently. With the pulses of pain making her wince at every heartbeat, she opted to move.

It took more energy and perseverance just to sit up, let alone make it up to the top of the bank. She lifted her spear high and rustled it in the dead grass on the top and yelled as she did. The silence indicated she was alone once more. She propped up the spear as she reached up and over for her only food. As she grabbed the grass and bit some off, she realized she could have had the wolf for her breakfast if she only had the tools and if she only knew how to kill properly. Now it was too late for that. If she didn't get out of this wolf's territory, it would surely have her instead.

As she pulled herself up over the bank, the fresh new pain coursing through her body made the stiffness from her mountain adventure seem pale in comparison. She wondered if she had been a bit of a baby about it all, that was, until she remembered the difficulty she had trying to stand after her nap yesterday.

"Stupid wolf," she muttered as she scanned the forest. "It's no wonder he's not in a pack."

"BABY WOLF!" she yelled at the immediate forest, just in case it wasn't as much of a coward as she thought it to be. The only reply was the movement of the pine branches as the rain danced off them. Taysha turned left and looked at the peaks that stood above the mist in between her and the Great Water. Keeping the river to her left, she limped onwards.

For the most part, travel through the valley was easier than in the mountains but there was a fair trade of good for bad.

The open forest took away her mental advantage of being on higher ground. The higher she was, the less there was above her that could hurt her. Here in the valley she was vulnerable front, back and to the sides. The undergrowth of the valley was also thicker than the mountainside and what time she gained on level ground, she lost either going around or fighting through thick undergrowth. The valley wasn't all so level as it looked from above, either. She had been slowly ascending and the easiest course led her away from the river and up the inclining banks. The river bed was lodged in a second narrow valley to a point she would have had to climb down rocks to get to it. On the other hand, she had been able to find food – two edible mushrooms. They were browning but still good enough to eat. Too small to satisfy, they made her stomach turn a bit as it anticipated more to come and forced her to stop and shit.

She had even turned over a few logs in the hope of finding a snake or lizard but to no avail. Her effort did provide her with three thick, juicy worms. A large pond she passed earlier on the valley floor still had frogs in them but they were too quick and the pond too deep to catch enough for a full stomach.

The rain had continued steadily and the clouds showed no sign of change. Taysha was literally soaked from head to toe. Even her finely made Amazoi boots had collected water.

She left the water in because it had heated and was keeping her feet warm. Her shoulders were cold despite her mantle. The fur was waterproof, but the water had long since worked its way in around the neck and front and arms.

Her nights in the valley consisted of her covering herself with branches and curling up in a ball for warmth. When the cold got to her, she stood and kept walking in the night, using the sound of the river to keep her on track. As she progressed, a sound of flowing water was gradually overtaken by the sound of the waterfalls.

She had climbed to the point where the mountains started and the water had to make its journey in jumps and falls. She got as close as comfortable to the edge of the cliff overlooking the top of the waterfall ahead of her. The noise of the steady stream held her in its magic for a while, telling her it was all right, and she was doing well, and her family were proud of her and waited for her in the Beyond.

The growing light in the sky was hard to read because the rain clouds hadn't changed colour. Her bruised ass had accepted the walking and climbing but now complained at sitting or standing in one spot for too long. Her wrist was still throbbing as if she had just fallen. The only thing that changed was that her throat was now fully hurting, and the rash on her arm was now an open sore. The last time she had looked, spots of blood lay just under the surface and the skin around it was red and tender.

She tried to think of what medical treatments would work but she could only recall the flowers or herbs of the spring and summer. There was nothing like that around now. There was the pale green plant that was used for pickling foods and stomach problems. Taysha knew it to be bitter and it would only make her feel sick if she ate it now.

The blue berries of one of the smaller pine trees would be in season, if she could only come across them. Even so, she would need to dilute them with hot water or they would just give her the runs, not something she needed more of at this time.

She would take her chance with the rash.

Besides, she would just burn it out if it got black or started to smell. Not that it mattered. She would soon get a new arm in the Afterlife anyway.

At least with her constant moving the cold hadn't bothered her much but she knew it wouldn't be the case for long. The terrain of the narrow valley she found herself in now was rocky and treacherous. Although the clear rocks made for easier climbing than the dirt slopes behind her, one more fall would be disastrous. That meant no more travelling at night. She would need to start making proper shelters again. At this point her spear-crutch was becoming more of a nuisance than an aid.

The sound of a flock of ducks flying overhead made her stop. They were flying towards the valley from which she had just come. No net. No bow. No arrow. Worms and grass for the Unlearned and Unskilled. It was hard to blame herself alone though. She hadn't been taught these things. The thought redirected her anger and frustration.

" _If that stupid boy and Tara hadn't gone back to the village, there would have been three of us here."_

The thought brought the familiar feeling of tears and choking in her throat. She was tired of crying. So tired. She tried to change her feelings with other thoughts.

"Three to hunt. Three in battle. Three friends. Three enemies. Three in the bed furs," she dryly sung the Amazoi drinking song. She was never really sure if the last part was just added as a joke or if it was serious.

She re-thought her condemnation of Tara's man and refocused the blame and responsibility on herself.

If she had asked her father about hunting and other things, he would have taught her. How to use the bow. How to survive for days or weeks on the hunt. If she had children, she would have her husband teach them. This was disgraceful, the condition that Taysha was in.

"Imagine..." she said weakly to whoever would hear her, "Now I know more than most of the women in the village. Any one of them would have gone back to the village and accepted their fate with the Hoorg ... disgraceful. Disgraceful..."

" _A true disgrace,"_ she thought, feeling the eyes of the Goddess upon her, _"Embarrassing. That's what it is. Embarrassing."_ Her thoughts took her to an alternate world, where she was the chieftain of the village and decreed that all women must learn the skills of hunting so that a man and woman could protect each other and their children and themselves.

"Wait. Wait, wait, wait ... no. Even the children will be taught! If the dirty Hoorg came to _my_ village, they would meet with ... a storm ... a storm of rock ... and iron ... spears and pointy sticks and arrows. The children would crush their feet with heavy rocks as we speared our attackers' bloated bellies!"

A daydream of revenge and a release of anger helped Taysha with every step. She stopped on a bald patch of rocks and looked behind her. The mist covering the valley floor was below her once again. The mountains where she had come from were barely visible in the distance. She had travelled well enough in her condition. For now she would just need to get up to the top of the waterfall ahead of her and find a place to sleep.

When she finally did, she was mildly disappointed to find another flat valley above the falls that curved round either side of the distant mountains. In fact, through the trees, she couldn't even tell which way the river went, other than farther up.

She recalled her earlier promise to herself to make proper shelters from then on, but she could hardly see the point of that now. If the wolf had followed her, it could eat pieces from her at its leisure for all she cared. What was there to fear now? Another fall? Another tribe? Less likely than a bear or wolf or mountain cat, or crazy boar.

Looking around the top of the waterfall, it was clear there was no way she could spend the night on the steep incline. So, she decided keep walking until she couldn't walk and then rest as she had the day and night before.

It was an idea that worked better in the valley than the narrow gorge. Spending much of the previous night shivering from the cold of the waterfall, she had managed to sleep no longer than a few short moments and travel no farther than a few stonethrows.

The fact she had been climbing, more than walking, contributing to these results.

It may have been a good thing she decided to continue moving at night. The sight of the cliff she traversed would have been a daunting task during the day when the bottom of the ravine was in full view. In fact, as the daylight started to creep into the valley the next morning, it took away the confidence the darkness had provided. Now it was too late to change her mind. She sat on the precipice looking down at the river below her. It wasn't a matter of a sprained wrist if she fell now. The best thing that would happen is to die on impact. The worst would be if she survived with broken arms and legs.

Taysha sat shivering in the shadow of the edge of the mountain. Once again, she was walking right leg higher, putting an uneven pressure on her ankles. And she was pretty sure these mountains were steeper than those near her village.

The progress was slow. Knowing her right arm would be no help to her if she fell, she gingerly proceeded, sleepy-eyed and half-dazed.

The farther she went, the colder the rain became and the stronger the wind blew. The pain was almost numbing to a point where she had to focus on the body part to determine where the pain was coming from. The knuckles on her left hand had grown white and the fingertips had lost their feeling. The mushrooms she had been finding and eating along the way had tricked her stomach into thinking she would eat properly. Her body had been complaining about that bit of mischief all night. Her stomach was constantly twisting and she had tried to shit again but nothing came out. Her face was marked and blemished. Her hair was a mix of greasy sweat, dirt, pine needles and endless rain. She couldn't remember the last time she had taken her boots off. She was now too scared to because if she took them off, she wouldn't be able to dry them. The boots would go cold and they would be horrible to put back on.

She had placed all these thoughts second to the focus on her next step. There was no room for trifles like food and warmth and dryness, sleep or comfort, or the company of friends or family. All these things were a memory. She thought she had been travelling four or five days now, but she wouldn't have been surprised if it had been longer.

Taysha tried counting the days past by counting the places where she slept, but the last few nights' journey of sleeping a little then traveling again until dawn was a blurry memory. She realized she had been walking but not seeing or thinking. Her mind had been drifting between sleep and consciousness, between the memories of her past, daydreams, and conversations that she wasn't sure had really happened.

She questioned if she had been at the large river yesterday or was it two days ago? Three? It didn't really matter. It could just have been part of her dreams. Perhaps it was a re-lived memory of the river she had been to as a child. No. The pain in her wrist told her that was real enough. The lack of sleep and the fatigue had finally taken over her mind. She realized it and tried to fight for control, but being overtired propelled her onward and she did not to sleep properly. Sometimes sleep would be a by-product of a short rest. She would reawaken as her head snapped up from her chest. At one point she woke up to find herself slumped over in a kneeling position. Without thinking, she simply scrambled to her feet and continued walking. When she awoke to find herself repeatedly stepping in the same place on a muddy embankment, the surprise gave her enough of a shock to snap out of it.

"Idiot! Idiot! You hafta ... gotta keep yer wits 'bout cha," she slurred.

Even so, for a long time now she had convinced herself this was a dream and she must keep going to escape the gods that chased her. She could see the ghoulish spawn in deformed men's shapes, sniffing the ground where she last encountered the wolf. Trying to find her scent. Running after her, past the pond with the frogs, up the gradually raising valley to the first waterfall. So quick. Screaming at her as they see her from afar.

In Taysha's panic to climb yet another waterfall to get away, she slipped into it. The water pushing her deep into the black water below. Deeper and deeper into the darkness. Her mouth opened.

"Ah!"

Taysha woke from the horrid dream with a start.

Her eyes eventually focused on the tuft of dead grass that had become her pillow. The noise from her quickened breathing filled her free ear. She dared not move until it was safe.

The realization the demons were only a dream sank slowly into her tired mind. Her eyes narrowed as she tried to recollect the past moments. She clearly remembered the feeling of falling down the waterfall and the weight of the water pushing her body down. She tried to focus on things that had really happened. The pain in the arm she was lying on directing her mind to her fall. That was real. She had established that earlier. It would be a good place to start.

Now she questioned whether she had really seen the wolf at all. After all, she had not been attacked. If that was a wolf, where had it been all night? Why hadn't it attacked? Didn't matter now. The time from the frog pond to where she lay now was a mixed blur in her mind, much like the way she felt after drinking fermented berry juice. She must have been far more tired far earlier than she had realized. She half expected to be back at the first waterfall. In fact, she could hear it. Only ... only it wasn't beside or behind her, but far, far ahead by the sound of it. She didn't move to look so she couldn't be sure. Maybe it was just the sound of the river that she could hear? Taysha did notice a couple of things as she lay there. She had her wits about her again and the rain had stopped.

The breath from her nose was moving one blade of grass across her chin, enough to make her want to move or to stop breathing. She brought her free arm around and laid it on the tickling grass as she let her mind play through all the scattered memories of the last few days. As she started the arduous task of getting up once again, it hit her.

" _The mushrooms?"_

"When did I eat the mushrooms?" she asked herself, "Oh, the gods must be kidding. I swear they were foodstuffs ... no ... but, what else could it be?"

She rocked her head back and forth a bit to compare the clarity she was feeling now to the confusion she had been feeling before. She recalled the memories of partaking of the Smoke and how it seemed to make the spirit move between the worlds. Combined with four or more days of stressful running and hiking it would be pretty much what she remembered feeling the last few days.

"Ha hahaha!" she bellowed hoarsely at the realization she had been making side journeys from her earthly one.

There were many plants, mushrooms, toxins and herbs that provided man with insight to the Afterlife. Some of which the Amazoi don't give to anyone before their Coming of Age, because as the elders say, some of the children don't come back from such journeys.

Taysha smacked her lips to get her mouth moist as she looked around. The blood had been cut off from her right arm and it hung lifelessly beside her. Taysha sat waiting for the familiar prickles of pain from when the blood started flowing back. She noticed she had apparently fallen onto a patch of dead grass that had grown out of the leafy ground last summer. Her back had been snug up against a small, moss-covered log that had kept her warm enough to sleep undisturbed. It had been fortunate. The condition of her body might have made it the last sleep she had in this Life. Had she fallen asleep on bare rock or hard cold earth, she may not have woken.

"At least it's not raining," she said to herself.

Her words were cracked and harsh. Still, the sound of her voice was so good to her. Refreshing. Earthy and real. Apart from that small good and the lack of rain, nothing else had gotten better. Legs, throat, wrist, headache, hunger, the cold, and the infection on her arm. Now she was unbelievably thirsty. Concentrating on the sound of the waterfall somewhere above her, she started to stretch her cramped legs while trying not to scream.

"At least ... there's ... no wolf," she said between gasps. She then caught herself feeling a little lonely at the realization.

The sound of the distant waterfall penetrated her foggy brain. She was still unaware of how far she had actually travelled and how much had been in her mind. She certainly didn't recognize where she was. The small fear she had been walking back and forth in a trance sat in the back of her mind. Regardless, the only thing to do was to continue.

With her wrinkled fingers, she grabbed the spear that lay at her feet and forced herself up. The rush of blood to her head almost made her pass out. If her legs had been working properly, she might have passed out. It was the sole thought of having to lift herself up again that deterred her from allowing herself to faint. Taysha stood and breathed as her head cleared. At least she was feeling mentally, if not physically, refreshed.

Taysha's progress was slow as she continued upward. She stopped only once to briefly look behind her. The dark clouds that stretched over the wide valley far below her were breaking like ice on a spring river. Through the shafts of light that connected earth with the sky, she was sure she could see the smoke from the Hoorg village as it drifted down into the valley mist. Her heavy eyes lingered on the view, knowing it would be the last time she would ever see it.

Eventually her body started to turn away as if by its own mind. And like a haggard old-woman who had lived beyond her years, she scuffled onward.

Her path eventually brought her into view of the waterfall. She was relieved to find it was not one she had already passed. This one was higher than the trees, and sat snug tight against the mountainside to her right. Comparing the route to the left of it, Taysha decided to go down to the river and find a place to cross so she could get up the slope on the other side.

By the time she made her way to the small, rocky clearing at the foot of the waterfall, a single stream of sunlight had broken through to join her. Taysha instinctively stopped as the warmth hit her face. Although the rain had ceased that morning, she was still soaking wet. Looking up at the clouds she figured it could possibly be sunny the next morning. If she stayed where she was, she might be able to dry her tunic, or at least the inside of her mantle. She might even have enough time to make another hood from branches.

As she stood there, Taysha marvelled at the clarity of her mind. It seemed to be separate from her body, which crumbled beneath her. It felt as though she was preparing to leave it like a toy raft breaking apart on a river. She could feel her body going, like one absconding log at a time. Soon there would be nothing to hang onto but the pieces. That would be her time to go. Back to her family that waited for her.

She inhaled deeply to refocus and look around.

The area at the base of the waterfall was flat enough to provide an area for a hut, but there was no hope of finding dry wood or a bed of pine needles for a comfortable night. Not to mention the constant pounding of the falls and cold mist would not let her sleep.

It was still too early to start worrying about shelter building anyway. Instead, she spent her time flipping rocks and wood over to see what was underneath.

She found and ate about a dozen worms. She also found a couple beetles but never having heard of anyone eating them, she let them go. Her recent mushroom experience had her in no mood to try new things.

After finding a decent sized snail, it became evident there were to be no more edible treasures.

Taysha sat on a rock in the clearing as she dug the mollusc out of its home with a twig. Another ray of sunshine kissed the side of the eastern mountain. Although it a good sign the weather was clearing, to Taysha, it was telling her the day would soon be over. Popping the morsel into her mouth, she instinctively climbed back the way she had come.

Back into the sunlight

She made a small seat of pine bows at the base of a large fir tree, then propped up the extra branches in a teepee style. The thought was to at least keep herself protected from a short downpour, rather than construct a place to sleep. Taysha had inadvertently created a nice tight hut that held her body heat in and the wind out. She sat with her knees to her chest and nursed her wrist. She was proud of the new shelter design. It showed her she could live without fire at all. It was an important lesson, she thought, considering how much work it took to keep a fire going even in dry conditions.

In the quietness of sitting still, Taysha was soon wrestling with the dark thoughts that entered her mind, pulling her to hatred, despair and hopelessness. She ended her tormentor's attacks by reminding herself she hadn't long before she joined the others. Her pittance of foodstuffs would soon see to that.

She had never seen anyone starve to death. Death from injuries, sure. Of many kinds. Sickness. Fights. Wild animals. Falls. Drowning. And of those who had grown weary of this life and let their souls free by their own hands. But dying from lack of food... She wondered what it felt like.

Her mother once told Taysha one's soul was like a bird in a hut. It would stay there, content, if properly fed and cared for. But, it's true place was in the trees and the sky.

Hearing that made the young Taysha realize she would have to consciously free her soul one day. It was a frightening thought which she likened to the killing of an old dog.

That was, until now.

Now she wished she knew exactly what to do, or say, to make it happen.

"How come they don't teach us how to free our souls?" she pondered. "I suppose if they did, we would all die and there would be none left. Maybe it's like falling into a deep, deep hole. Once you've found a way in, you can't just jump out again and say, _"Hi everyone, look what I just found!"_

A wry smile crossed her lips at the image of Fulan, the energetic man with the big cock, appeared in her head. She could see him dancing naked around at the top of some bottomless crevasse of Death, pointing down into it, excited about coming back from it. Everyone in the village was standing around, with looks of amazement on their faces as they wondered how he had gotten out.

"I bet he's still alive. He's too crazy for the Hoorg to kill."

She shut her eyes and told her mind she had thought all she could for this day. There would be time to fill her head with thoughts tomorrow. The same onslaught of pain and cold fought against her sleep but she managed to get through the night with only the odd twist or a turn to reposition herself. Had she been dry, she would have had quite a peaceful sleep.

The cold, damp clothes would just have to wait for the sun of morning.

\- - - - -
The steady rumble of the waterfall woke Taysha gradually. From her half-opened eye she could see the brightness of a clear sky. Her breathing and heartbeat increased at the sight. If she had the energy, she would have smiled.

She opened her mouth to recite her Morning Prayer but quickly shut it. It felt as if someone had poured sand into her mouth while she slept. She pushed her way out of her little hut to better see the sun hitting the top of the mountains far above her. Deep in the valley it was still shady and cold, but the promise of sunshine later that day raised her spirits.

As for her body, her sore throat was now the worst to endure. She took a look at her arm. It was swollen, still red, and now with runny white pus. She figured she would leave it alone, not that she could do much about it anyway. At least it itched less now.

Taysha took her time stretching and loosening her leg muscles. She was pleased to see there wasn't a cloud in the sky. There was even a slight feeling of pride at having made the journey up the mountainous ravine. If she had been in the broad valley below, she would have been surrounded by mist until midday. By the line of sunlight on the top of the mountain across the river, she knew she had at least two hand-spaces of the sun's movement before the light would be where she could benefit.

The wind was chilly and encouraged her to move as quickly as she could down to the river. The route was steep, but short, and not the worst thing she had endured so far. The cold of the water bit her skin as she dipped her hands in to splash her face. It did nothing to revitalize her. In fact, it only aggravated her throat and sent a deep chill inside her. It also made her aware of either a new scratch or another infection on her cheek. She did her best to clean and ready herself but for some reason she dawdled, moving from one rock to another, sitting and standing to stretch her back and legs. She knew it was simply putting off the inevitable. She had to cross the river. Before she knew it, she was jarred awake as her body tried to stop her from falling off a rock.

Taysha looked up at the sun and quickly realized how much of the day she had wasted, the line of the sun had glided halfway into the valley.

It now touched the tops of the trees opposite her, telling her she would need to cross soon. Even so, she waited until the sun had filled the valley before she convinced herself to proceed.

It was the uncertainty of crossing the river that was causing so much hesitation. There were few solid places to step and whichever path she chose, she would be getting her feet wet.

At least, once she made it to the other side, she would be able to sit in warmth and dry her clothes properly. There she would have two or more hand movements of the sun to rest. The area was clear of trees and large enough so that she could move around and not stiffen up. She had already chosen the branches she would try to break off to make a better poncho and those she would use to hang her clothes. She had also picked out the large, flat rock where she could lie naked in the sun.

Taysha moved to the narrowest point of the river to cross and stood until she caught herself staring into nothing. She knew it was the fear of the cold that stopped her. With a determined inhale, she started to take off her clothes. The wind on her wet skin made her shiver as she wrapped it all into a bundle. Tying it off with her sash, she tossed it across the river with her left hand. It rolled precariously close to the river's edge. So close, in fact, that Taysha had already started to stumble sideways along the river to catch it before it fell in. The bundle hit the last rock before the water and stayed put.

The understanding of what it would have meant if her clothes had been taken over the lower waterfalls made Taysha's knees weak. She lowered herself to a nearby rock to calm herself, but the cold on her bare skin soon forced her to stand. She had no choice but to cross now. Before she started, she looked behind her once again. For a moment, she wished for the company of the wolf. The trees and shadows showed no sign of him, and she found herself feeling lonely.

"We're both alone. We could have been friends," she said aloud for him to hear.

For the first time, she regretted her earlier outbursts of fear and panic. Only now did it seem clear the wolf had never intended to attack her. She looked back to where her first step would go and she gripped her spear in anticipation.

"Goddess," she said simply and started to cross the river.

The feeling of a thousand daggers tore at her legs and crawled into her boots like a swarm of stinging bees. It made her head arch up and her wrist explode in pain. It felt as if she had jumped barefoot into a fire. The pain made her scramble across, slipping on the smooth stones, and losing her balance in the sideways current. The step that landed her up to her thigh in water caused her to gasp and panic as she bounded for the opposite shore. She threw her spear away from the river as she clawed her way up onto the safety of the small rocky shore.

But the pain remained and continued to harass her.

"I... I'm sss ... sorry. F... forgiveme forgiveme," she stammered to the god Torik.

Taysha remembered the elders' stories about the River God's winter slumber and how man was best not to disturb him. She wouldn't be quick to do that again, if ever. She grabbed her bundle of clothes and scrambled up the hill to the clearing.

The sunlight greeted her kindly and caressed her head as quickly as the river cold had attacked her legs. It was as if the Goddess was bidding her welcome.

She crouched on the sunlit rock she had reserved for herself and held her legs tight against her chest. It felt as if the warmth poured over her like a shower of heated water. It smoothed the cold out of her in shivers, like wringing out a wet cloth. She leaned over to release her feet that were still trapped in their pools of water. Undoing wet leather laces was a task at the best of times. Doing so while shivering and with one hand provided more of a challenge than she could have imagined.

Taking off her boots revealed her white, wrinkled feet, which contrasted against the splotches of red from her blisters. She decided she would not do any hiking up mountains until they had dried and replenished their colour.

The rock she sat on was still cold, so she forced herself up to grab branches and some moss. Both were wet, but would dry quickly. When they did, they would provide a comfortable enough seating.

As she organised herself, she noticed the sun was not passing directly from valley side to valley side. "I'm on the west side? The south?" she said both to herself and the mountain, trying to gauge where the sun started and where it was heading.

When she figured out the valley ran due west, she took the time to rebuke herself for not paying attention to where the sun actually had risen from. That's all she needed now; to never find the Great Water by fault of her own stupidity.

She had turned her mantle, tunic, sash and shoes inside out and made a new poncho. It had a more comfortable fit to the head, with more pine boughs from top to shoulder and a strap of stripped bark to keep it secure. She extended the back-part down to her waist and to her chest at the front.

The wind was still chilling enough at times to give her goose bumps but it was an acceptable condition for an early winter day of cloudless skies. When Taysha could see the sun reaching the top of the western mountains, she limped down to the river bed to wash herself properly. Her monthly time was pretty much done, which gave her a good indication of how long she had actually been travelling.

When the shadows had begun creeping back into the valley. She checked her clothes. Her tunic was warm and dry, although only on one side. The inside of her bearskin mantle had dried well enough and it help keep the heat of her tunic comfortably around her. Her leather boots were a problem. They had shrunk and hardened every so slightly. Just enough for her to have to use both hands to put them back on. The frustration and pain from this usually simple task brought Taysha to the brink of tears. When an instinctive cry for her mother to help reached her lips, she stopped and gave herself time to breathe.

She knew she could not act the little-girl any more.

Selfish tears were a luxury she could not afford, and she decided they were no longer a necessary tool for her.

Gritting through the pain, she pulled on her boots with a grim determination. As she sat nursing her wrist, she couldn't help but envision a proud smile from her father.

Her firestarter tools were still useless but, then again, so was most of the wood around her. She tucked them away in her tunic sash, figuring she would just have to go without fire for another night.

Taysha had started her climb to the top of the waterfall when she realized she hadn't checked the bottom pool for fish. Surely there wouldn't be any. How would they get there? On a ridge between two waterfalls? Even so, paranoia almost took hold of her, telling her if she didn't climb back down to the ridge to check, she would surely die.

Rocking back and forth unsure of which direction to head in, Taysha recalled the words of her grandmother regarding the voices of the mischievous gods that invade the mind. When Taysha had asked how she could tell which thoughts were her own and which came from the gods, her grandmother said, "The whisper of the gods leads to indecision." Taysha strengthened herself knowing the short trip down and back up again would drain her of the energy she needed to finish the climb. If there were fish there, she would have noticed when she stood at the river's edge.

Taysha's victory over her panic did not go unnoticed. She only regretted having learned so much, so close to her end.

She passed into the falling shadow as she climbed. The sun was still somewhere in front of her but the deep valley and height of the mountain kept it hidden. Taysha hoped there would not be another waterfall at the top. Not only because it would mean one more to climb, but also because the mists from the falls would continue to chill her. That was the main reason she was climbing now, so that she could have a warmer sleep, otherwise she would have been happy to stay where she was. She had to get away from the river to escape the cold it brings, something not so easily done in the narrow gully.

The top of her climb showed her there was indeed another waterfall but it was far in the distance where the river separated and it wasn't very high. From what she could see, it seemed to Taysha that the main part of the valley turned to her left above those falls. It would lead her to the line of mountains ahead of her. She would worry about those when she got there.

The valley widened out a bit more and there on the flatter land, she figured there would be a better supply of food. She thought to look for worms again but found her stomach not caring too much at this point. Although hungry, she had more discomfort when she ate little bits than when she ate nothing.

After last night's cramped sleep, she decided it more worthwhile making another small shelter on a tree and filling it with soft boughs than to spend time rummaging for food.

Despite the full day of lying in the sun, she felt as tired as if she had been walking since morning. She noticed the negative effect of her rest later that night. The good naps she had taken in the sun had stolen her ability to sleep and she once again lay in the darkness alone with her pains and fighting the demons in her tormented mind.

The next morning was cloudy and cold. Her headache, which had been the least of her problems yesterday, was vying for attention with her swollen wrist. Perhaps partly from the result of a dream she couldn't remember, and partly because she could feel the clarity of her mind slipping from her once again, Taysha felt at her lowest this day. Her legs felt heavy and her head hung on her chest as she refused to rise. The sun, that was supposed to provide her with renewed energy and power, took it from her with its failure to show that morning. The thought of enduring more days of rain made her roll onto her side and curl into a ball, pushing out the sides of her shelter as she did. The more she tried to savour the warmth, the colder other parts of her body felt and the tighter her muscles became. Her shoulders, the small of her back, and especially her feet, started throbbing in pain. Mostly it was the pounding in her head that finally drove her to get up and out into the morning chill.

She carried her spear more out of duty now than actual usefulness as she followed the sound of the river hidden in the mist. Detouring to the river to drink, she collected a handful of worms before washing them and swallowing them whole. Travelling along the river, she periodically checked for fish and ate the odd green leaf or grasses. The climb was steadily upward and at each little waterfall she passed she felt the struggle within herself to just stop and lie down. She told herself that beyond this last waterfall, the river would turn to the west and take her straight down to the Great Water.

She envisioned the Great Water as she walked on at a snail's pace. By evening, she had only gone such a short distance that she could have looked back and seen the point of the hill where she slept the night before.

The northern mountains that had been on her right during her climb up the valley were now behind her.

Taysha stopped at a huge area where the mountain opposite her had collapsed in a rock slide that had cleared the trees all the way down across the river. She stood on one of the largest boulders and leaned on her makeshift spear to look around. Far off, at the end of the valley, stood the biggest mountain Taysha had ever seen. It was already covered in snow. By the looks of it, it was covered in snow year-round. She rubbed her eyes before staring blankly at this new wall of mountain towering above the others in the distance. It stood silently like a giant at the gates of a jewelled city of the gods. It was clear to Taysha it would not let her pass. She could see now that it should have been obvious to her much earlier. She had been following the river upstream. It should go downstream to a great body of water, not up. She had led herself up to a valley surrounded by impassable mountains that would stand laughing as she died at their feet.

The heat of the sun broke through the scattering clouds, warming her for a brief moment before losing its battle to the chill of the wind.

She had wrapped pine boughs around her thighs and arms, as it had been turning colder with each day. The imposing line of western mountains in front of her attested to this by their recent mantle of snow.

Taysha stood swaying with the rhythm of the pain in her body as the thoughts of all she could remember, and what she could imagine, and what would possibly happen to her, swept through her mind. Her eyes fell on the scattered rocks below, to the river, and back up to the mountain across from her. Without much purpose of thought, she assumed the rockslide had happened long, long ago. Her eyes mapped out a route across the rocks and boulders purely by habit. When she realized what she was doing, she looked up to the top of the slide between the two snow-covered peaks.

"Hm," she said out loud at the thought.

She could climb up through the passage.

" _To what?"_ she argued in her head, _"To more of what lies here? To wolves or waterfalls or some new tribe?"_ She teetered on her feet as she looked up and down the valley.

" _To the Great Water ...?"_ Her last thought sounded more like a futile attempt at convincing herself than anything.

"And what lies in wait for me here?" she asked the sky. Her voice was tired and was carried away with the wind before it even reached her own ears. "Death ... yes ... and I'm so tired, so tired. It could be worse ... It could be worse." Taysha's words showed her the ramblings of her mind too clearly and she stopped talking. She stood hoping for a sign from the gods. She looked up for a bird. Listened for the howl of a wolf. A rainbow. A wanderer. But there was nothing. Instead a quiet voice in her head told her, _"This is your decision. Carry on and there will be more of your story to tell. Stay here and your story will end. Either way your journey will eventually take you to the same place."_

She wondered how many stories of adventures were never told because the hero had simply stopped. She understood now the importance and relevance of such stories. She started thinking of what amazing stories they really were.

"Hah!" she crowed hoarsely to the gods, "Stories are only good if there's someone to tell them to!" Her head hung as she continued to sway in rhythm to the pain and the wind. Yet, she couldn't help giving a furtive glance at the passage high above. It was as if it was calling her.

" _Come on! Play with me. See what I see on the other side."_

The corners of her mouth curled into a half smile, mostly from cynicism than from actual humour. The smile faded from her mouth as she looked down at the pattern of the rocks along the valley that would take her to the next verse of her tale.

Before she lost her balance, or her legs gave out on her, Taysha started to climb off the boulder to make her way across the river that lay between her and the new unknown.

A few days ago, she could have made it up and over the pass in less than a day. But now, after searching for a crossing at the river in her weakened state, she only made it half way up the mountain before the skies started turning dark. Higher on the mountain, the cold now kept her from sleeping all together. She knew to stop now would mean certain death. And, surprising herself, Taysha discovered she wasn't ready to give in so easily.

Once again, she decided to keep moving.

Progress was slow and it weakened her further. At one point, though she had nothing to throw up, a spell of dry heaving got so bad she had to stop. The shakes that had started coming in long bouts a couple days ago had now completely overcome her. She was constantly shaking as she drove herself forward.

By the time the sun disappeared that day she was in view of the top of the pass. It was bitterly, bitterly cold and the clouds forming above her gave hints the area would be next in line to receive another layer of snow. This thought pressed her to move through the darkness until she reached the top.

It would have been a glorious view from there come morning had she been in the condition to enjoy it; instead, she only noticed the sea of shadowy mountain tops that lay before her. The mountains spread out as far as she could see. For the first time, Taysha clearly doubted the existence of such a place as the Great Water at all.

The snow started falling as she stood there. It was a deep, heavy snowfall that blanketed out her view like a woven cloth. Taysha blinked as snowflakes landed on her eyelashes. It was the simplest of events, but for some unexplainable reason, it prompted Taysha to take the first step and continue.

The persistent cold followed her down the mountain, and she continually told herself to just give up. This time, she was sure that it was _her_ who was asking to die. Who the voice was that pressed her onwards, she did not know. But she did continue. As if in a drunken stupor, she continued.

When she found a large plateau jutting out almost level from the mountainside, she stopped. It had the familiar collection of pine needles, and the odd leaves from which she could make a quick mattress and covering to sleep in.

The feelings of despair and pain that usually produced tears now only brought forth heavy short breaths. Her dehydrated body had no liquid to spare for trivial things like tears. She covered herself with pine needles and leaves, and some time between the pulses of pain she fell asleep.

\- - - - -
The next morning it was raining slightly. It was actually the rain hitting her face that had woken her. During the night she had somehow brushed the covering off her head and she now lay still, moving only her eyes to look around her latest camp.

It seemed to already be around midday, but the time was neither important nor interesting to Taysha. All she knew was that she felt pain. Her legs, head, arm, wrist, neck, throat, and three days of coughing had brought tension to the muscles in her entire body. Nothing was healing or getting better. Everything was getting worse and more things were being added to the burden she had to carry. Yet, this morning her mind felt strangely at ease as if she had gotten used to the constant discomfort. She gingerly turned her head and stared into her new environment, watching the rain dripping and scattering through the trees.

How long she lay like this, she didn't know. Then again, she had stopped measuring time a long time ago. More precisely, she had stopped since her experience with the mushrooms. She recalled the day she had sat in the sun by the waterfall. She knew there had been a cold breeze at times but her memory was of warmth, a warmth she now felt only existed in her mind.

She slipped in between thoughts and dreams, at one point coming to and realizing she had been staring at a tree in front of her, although she didn't remember when she had opened her eyes. All the while she hadn't moved a muscle. Her breathing was quiet and steady.

She then suddenly felt as if she was underwater, being pulled and pushed by the current, only to once again awake to find herself propped up on her arm trying to breathe. The sudden waking again sent her heart beating in fear. She couldn't discern if she was still in a dream. A wave of nausea swept over her and she quickly scrambled out of her pine needle bed in an attempt to stabilize her swimming soul.

The pain added to the confused state of her mind as she pulled herself up by a nearby tree and held on for support. The nausea felt like a dog jumping all over her. She reeled and instinctively started half falling down the hill as if trying to escape it; as if the place she was in was the cause of the feelings.

She stumbled down along the top of the wide ridge.

Going from tree to tree, she used both hands to steady herself until the pain in her sprained wrist became too much for her. She then alternated between her left hand and her right shoulder as she smashed into trees in a full panic. She tried to escape from the grasp of this sickness continually sweeping over her. At this point, the nausea fuelled the panic, which in turn fuelled the nausea. She kept bouncing between trees, cutting through underbrush and tripping over logs until something through the trees caught her eye.

It seemed the Spirit of Nausea noticed it too, for it stopped harassing her as she hung on to a small tree and looked out onto a wide, bowl-shaped valley spread before her. It wasn't as big as the valley she had had the run-in with the wolf, but it showed an even level of tree tops that were enclosed in a crescent of mountains with an opening to the west. There, in the centre of the valley, was the most beautiful sight she had ever seen: a blur of smoke.

It seemed to be the combination of pillars of smoke from five or so fires rising into the air just above the bottom tree line. For a moment, Taysha stood like a baby who had been distracted from a good cry, then the nausea returned. It wasn't as overpowering as when it had started after her deep sleep. This time she was able to fight against the panic and breathe heavily through her open mouth as she let the sick feeling run its course.

The location of the smoke was still a day's walk for her in her condition, and there was no guarantee she would find safety there. Regardless, her only choice was to move towards it. Friend or Foe, she was at her end anyway. Had she noticed the smoke just three days ago, she would have avoided it.

" _Better dead, than raped and enslaved."_

But now, with her body and mind tattered and broken, she was of a different mindset. Her soul was hiding deep inside her like a bird in a bush, or a mouse in the ground. Her body was in command now and it craved food, drink, dryness and warmth.

Taysha could only watch from a distance and hope for a good outcome as she followed her body down the mountain towards the smoke.

She quickly lost sight of it in the trees, and she relied on the slope of the mountain to help guide her. The only danger was of curving too far to her left and missing the source of the smoke completely. A flash of thought that the smoke might be from a hunting party went through her mind. A hunting party could move along and she would arrive at an empty camp site. The idea caused her breathing to increase and it forced her along at a faster pace until she recalled the amount of smoke she had seen.

"Too much ... for hunting party," she stammered as she ran and then hobbled along, "Too, too much. It's a village.... Hasta be, hastabe a village. Hastabeavillage. Hastabeavillage."

She tried to calm herself and proceed at a safer pace, only realizing now she had forgotten her spear at the last campsite.

"Mah!" Her coarse cry echoed her thoughts on the matter.

" _Never did any good. Shit stick._ "

Taysha flicked her fingers up into the air at the gods in defiance.

"Now y'can send d'wolves, ei?" she slurred disrespectfully to show it wouldn't surprise her. Nothing would surprise her now. "Eh? Gods? Youlist'ning? Sendem' send em now. Cunts!"

She cursed and swore at them as her head flopped up and down with each step; the muscles in her neck had long ago given up on her.

It started growing dark as she continued on, stumbling and dragging herself over fallen logs. She kept telling herself if she could find the village she would have food and shelter that night. But if she fell and injured herself, she would die where she lay. Like she told the gods, it wouldn't surprise her. If she fell and twisted her ankle, it would seem a pathetic and fitting end to her struggles. It would be another good laugh for the gods.

The side of the mountain turned into the flats of the valley and she knew she was getting closer. After being so many days without fire, she could smell the smoke like a wild animal. Her head was reeling and she had to force herself to stop and sit for a moment. As she did, she put her nose up and sniffed in the air, drawing in deep breaths filled with the ever so faint, yet tasty smell of the fires.

Then her head hit the ground with a bump.

\- - - - -

When Taysha came to, it took a while for her to understand where she was. She was confused that the forest was upside down and a dark grey. Her neck was twisted badly from having passed out and landing on top of her head. Her tongue had rested on the top of her mouth and made her snort as she breathed. It seemed it had been raining too. Her back and legs were slightly wet, as was the ground around her.

The night brought with it instant worry. She scanned the forest around her looking for a hint of what had happened and where she was as the memories came to her in patches. Realizing she had probably just passed out, she sat down and cursed her weakness. She would have found the light of the fire if she had continued during the night. Now it was most likely closer to morning, and that meant the fires were probably out.

Taysha pushed herself up to walk around a bit in hopes it wasn't as late as she thought, but she saw no signs of light through the trees. She kept near where she had passed out, so as not to lose the lay of the land that had brought her there so far. She figured it best to wait until she could clearly see the mountain on the east side before she continued. In any case, she found she couldn't stand for very long.

The nausea had decided to stop coming in waves and just move in all together. A steady uneasiness in her stomach and legs made her want to move again, yet the weakness she felt made the final decision in the matter for her. Taysha's body was no longer capable of moving any more that night.

She lay down, curled up and instinctively clawed at the ground, dragging whatever she could towards her in a feeble effort to build a bed around her. It was as if her body was moving by instinct like a goat with a cut throat that had wiggled loose from its executioner's grip. Tired of trying to better the situation, she gave up and waited for dawn.

She drifted in and out of consciousness during the night as the rain gently fell. The light of the returning sun helped to create a more distinct line between the reality her body lay in and the reality her soul lay in. The latter, lost beyond time and physical borders, was not making it easier on her earthly domain.

The day grew lighter as she argued with her body from the depths of her being.

" _You must get up. You can't come this far and then stop. It's not fair to me. I've done so well. Please."_

"Please!"

Her broken voice once again pulled her out of the trance long enough to bring her back to the physical world. The first thing Taysha noticed was that her spirit had been so far away that she had stopped hearing the wind in the trees. As the rustling sounds in the valley returned to her, they brought with them the familiar smell of campfire. The small bit of energy she desperately needed enabled her to struggle to her knees. The push up from her knees to stand was the hardest of all the days so far. Now, a gust of wind would have pushed her down forever. But no wind came and she turned and stumbled in the direction she believed a village to be. Her steps became short and jerky and her arms hung low at her sides. She held her eyes just high enough to see the next two steps ahead. It was all she could do. One step would propel the next step, which would propel the next. The slightly sloping ground helping her along.

Her breathing through her nose deepened. She could smell it. Smoke. It was clearer than just a vague evenness in a valley. It smelled the way the smoke smelled from a village when one was close. She thought it funny how she hadn't noticed how strong the smell was before. It seemed to form a wall or a room that one walked into.

Her anguish showed on her face as she feared it a trick of the mind or that had she run full circle and would soon be at the doors of the Hoorg who would laugh and jeer her stupidity.

One step. Two step. One step. Two step. Stumble. Recover. Continue. Quicker now. She briefly noticed an open field of grass, large enough for a small tribe to settle. Beyond, floating above the trees, three clear pillars of smoke mixed as they rose.

She trotted towards them like a wounded animal through the seemingly endless forest. It felt so far away that once again she panicked, thinking that it had all been her imagination. But the smell was mixed with foodstuffs. Spices and meat. Then there were sounds. Children playing and what she thought were geese. It was not a mistake. She was very close.

She pushed her way through the underbrush to where she could see the huts. They were taller than those she was used to and were built up on stones to about waist height.

They were arranged in a circle on a little hill that sat just within the forest. Through the trees on the other side, she could tell by the light there was a great clearing of some sort. A river came from somewhere behind Taysha's left and ran past the village on one side. There were women at the river washing clothes. In between the spaces of the huts she could see people walking this way and that. Though they had black hair like her people, they looked different from the Amazoi. Their skin was darker and the colors of their clothes were brighter. She found it rather amusing that her mind lingered on the fact that their noses were bigger than her people's.

Something made Taysha hesitate and she quickly realized what it was. She was waiting for the inevitable bark of a dog, but none came. Knowing there were no dogs to announce her arrival, she stepped out from behind the trees and walked unchallenged through the opening between the nearest huts. She hadn't had time to absorb the view inside the village before the yelling of an old woman distracted her. The old woman seemed to have been sitting with her granddaughter weaving a basket at the entrance of the hut to her right. The woman held the look of surprise and anger at the intruding foreigner, as a flood of insults was released from her lips. It was no wonder, seeing the condition that Taysha was in with her poncho of pine bows half ragged, and dirty, with sores covering her from head to foot. She was hardly recognisable as a human, let alone a young woman of 14 Winters.

The old woman was quickly joined by a neighbour and a crowd of mostly women gathered soon after. They shooed her away with their hands and with hissing sounds through their teeth. This all happened rather suddenly and it would have been quite a lot for even one who had their wits about them to handle. For poor Taysha it was overwhelming to the point where the more they yelled, the more she didn't know what to do.

Eventually one of the younger women picked up a stone and held it high for Taysha to see. This triggered an instinctive response from her and she felt a spasm run through her body, enabling her to move once more. She had no power left to flee and could only slowly turn and shrug her shoulders high, bringing her neck and head as close to her body as she could to avoid the eventual blow.

Her arms were as stiff as a tree branch and she held them out crooked and unnaturally, expecting to be hit at any moment.

Behind her the women's voices were becoming mixed with those of the men but Taysha didn't turn around to look.

Her only thought was to walk away until she was hit or left to go.

Trembling, she made it past the huts and started back into the forest. She could hear the group of villagers assembling by the river and remaining a safe distance from her. They did not attack, but their banter was an unwelcome invasion to Taysha's senses. After being alone in the quiet for the last few days, the people yelling and screaming brought memories of the attack on her village.

Her arms were still held up stiffly to protect her head as she left the noises of the people behind her. She made it back to the clearing she had walked through earlier. It looked as good a place as any to just lie down and die.

And that's what she did.

And that's how the young man found her.

\- - - - -
Bajesh, a young man from the village, had been returning from collecting firewood with his father just as the barbarian girl had been chased away.

He had stood in the distance with his father, quite taken aback by the event, and more so at the reaction of their people. The pathetic sight of the girl turning around delicately and ducking her head into her shoulders as she made her wobbly escape had burned deep into Bajesh's soul. The yells of uncalled-for hatred and sudden exile of this poor creature brought a lump to his throat. How cruel. How ignorant. Did anyone even try to communicate with her? It was easy to see she was sick and had not eaten for days.

By the time she had reached the forest, Bajesh had dumped his firewood by the family hut and disappeared inside. He took a blanket, dried bread, some foodstuffs, a flint set and an empty gourd. He came out of the hut directly in front of his father who was arranging the firewood properly in its place. The look from his father made Bajesh stop as he glanced over to see the crowd still bickered on. His gaze turned back to his father, who was now standing with wood in each hand looking at the supplies Bajesh was carrying.

"Do you have a weapon, son?"

"Yes, Father."

His father looked over to the group of people now more involved in an argument between the genders rather than over their mysterious guest. Bajesh's mother was among them comforting the old woman who first saw the intruder.

"Don't let your mother see you," he added as he returned to his work.

"Yes, Father."

Bajesh smiled as he bolted around behind their hut. Behind him he could hear his father add, "Go with Wisdom."

Bajesh intended to.

He would have to run around the village to avoid being seen by the others and fill the gourd with water on the way. He wasn't so worried about anyone stopping him. In fact, he was more concerned of whether anyone would insist on going with him.

Bajesh didn't want anyone tagging along and complicating things, especially when it looked like all she wanted was some food. He wondered where she had come from.

"So much for our protective ring of mountains," he mocked at the thought of a girl traversing the protective ring around their hidden valley by herself. It was a feat that impressed him greatly.

"Maybe she started with a family and they fed her when they had none to eat. Then they died. And she lived after they died. Perhaps she's an orphan ... or an outcast from the Kingdom of the Lesser Gods."

His mind filled with stories and questions to ask the girl. He could hear the chatter of the others diminishing as the distance between him and the village grew. He could still hear the few voices that he recognized as the ones who always tried to carry things on after they were finished. Always arguing after the point was made, or "feeding a slaughtered lamb," as his people would say. Bajesh hated that type of person. He was a quiet young man and felt there was little reason to carry on in such a dramatic fashion.

He managed to circle around without drawing the attention of any adult in the village. His worry now would be the kids. He noticed that some who were going to follow the "dirty girl" had been called back by the adults. Bajesh was sure they would not disobey them by going again.

He found the girl's trail easily enough.

It led towards the clearing that sat at the end of the woods. He assumed she was heading there but diligently followed the path. He was an experienced hunter already and had been taught not to imagine what was ahead. It was better to see for yourself. According to his father, to guess the future and then feel proud that it had turned out the way one imagined was a fool's game.

"Think of the step before you. Not your destination."

Eventually, he found the girl in the clearing just as he thought. She was lying right in the middle of the field, curled up against the cold. Had it been summer, the grass would have hidden her like a deer, but the yellow stalks had since been beaten down by the autumn rains and she lay bare to the elements and prey to the predators.

Bajesh walked up to her quietly enough to get near, but made enough noise to make his presence known. When she heard him approaching, she covered her head with her arm to protect herself from the expected blows of a stick or rock. She tried to look up to see her attacker, but the rain kept her eyes from focusing.

"Na. Na," Bajesh spoke to her in his most soothing voice. "Sastupe. Sastupe. Conmun?"

It was evident the girl understood nothing. He tried to make it clear he had not come to hurt her, but she still kept her arm over her head.

"Hakchere mon? Do? Sokere?" he continued as he carefully approached her. She started to back away weakly. At the sight of the girl's short retreat, Bajesh stopped walking and talking to give her a moment to examine him. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut and reopened them to see him hold out the gourd and shake it from side to side so the water made a splashing sound. He smiled at her as he did, bidding her come forward to take it. But she would not budge.

Bajesh took a step, and then stopped when he could see the apprehension show once again on the poor girl's dirty face. He leaned forward with the gourd and stretched it out towards her while he spoke in his most comforting voice.

"Don't worry. I will not harm you."

He knew she wouldn't understand, but he had learned the power of the spoken word from his father and some of the tribe who always seemed to hold influence over the others. When they spoke in a certain way, there was nothing more to be said afterwards. The decision was made. And it was right. And that was that.

This was the tone of voice he used and he was happy to see the tactic seemed to work among different peoples of the world. The girl finally reached out to receive his gift.

As he handed the gourd to her, his feeling of compassion for the girl overcame him and his eyes started to water.

"This poor thing. What ever has happened to her?"

\- - - - -
Taysha stayed lying on her side as she drank the water. She kept gulping it down even though it stung her throat. When the gourd was empty, she dropped her arm and her head fell to the earth once more. She couldn't even show the gratitude she felt inside.

The boy's feet came into her view of the grass in front of her. He squatted down and placed a thick rolled-up blanket beside her.

"Nifarvojateem."

She looked up at him and their eyes met. Her gaze was shallow and empty and she knew it. She looked at this dark-skinned boy with a big nose and dark, black curly hair. His dancing eyes and face full of compassion made her look away in shame. She couldn't even cry, let alone show how much his kindness meant to her.

"Nifarovjateem," he said again as he motioned for her to put the blanket under her poncho and mantle so as not to let it get wet. He prodded the thick cloth into her fingers. The texture of the blanket felt like it had been woven with oils or mixed with fats to give it a type of waterproofing. She wasn't sure if it was used for a shelter or a ground mat. Until she was sure, she figured she would just keep it rolled up the way he gave it to her.

As she lay there looking at the roll of thick cloth, the boy started taking out foodstuffs from inside his tunic. There was a mixture of dried fruits and berries with smoked fish. The water she had drunk had gone to work, making her stomach move and her mouth moisten. When he held them out in front of her, she reached out without a thought and grabbed a handful of dried berries from his hands, and put most in her mouth in one motion.

Somehow, deep down, her mind was working enough to keep her eyes averted in humiliation.

"This boy must think I'm an animal," she thought as she chewed.

\- - - - -
"Understandable," Bajesh thought, inspecting the scratches her nails had made on his hand. "I'm sure it's not her regular custom to act like this. She must be starving."

Bajesh sat and studied her face as she ate. She had black hair like those of his people but even through her skin was tanned he could tell she was of a lighter coloured people. Her nose was small and dainty, but looked as if some unseen finger was pressing lightly on the tip. Her eyes were large and captivating.

He was concerned about the girl's condition and especially the cuts and bruises on her arms and face. He would have to come back later and bring some ointments for her. She would also need some twine if she were to make a shelter. He would have to steal a knife for her as well. Then he realized he would have to know what to call her when he returned, as he doubted she would still be sitting out in the middle of the field.

"Soheronav?" he directed the question at her chewing mouth.

"S... soheronav?" he repeated, but the girl only stared blankly back at him. Bajesh gave his chest a couple of light pats before rubbing in a circle as he continued.

"Maybuhovbajesh," he said and added a few pats on his chest. "May-bu-hov... Ba-jesh," he repeated slowly, "Bajesh."

It was clear the unfortunate girl understood right away and knew what Bajesh wanted when he once again asked her name with his open hand stretched out in her direction.

"Soheronav?"

"... sha..."

Her first attempt to speak appeared to be hampered by a sore throat. She swallowed painfully and tried again in a whisper, "Tay-sha," she said as she moved her sprained wrist to indicate herself. Bajesh noticed her wrist was swollen and red. "Taysha." she repeated.

"Ah... Tay-sha," Bajesh confirmed. Despite the seriousness of their situation, as smile crept over his face. And for a moment, he was certain Taysha's eyes softened towards him.

"Haahaaha."

Bajesh broke into a nervous laugh and then pressed his lips together tightly to stop himself.

Taysha looked back at him like a startled baby, not knowing what to make of the sudden outburst. He gave her an embarrassed look but could not hide his happiness.

"Taysha ... Taysha," he repeated so as not to forget. He then motioned to himself once more to remind her, "Bajesh. Bajesh." He pointed to each of them, "Taysha. Bajesh."

He let out a softer laugh and once again stopped himself out of respect. He hated himself when he did that. But, to his joy, he caught Taysha smiling the best she could in response. She obviously wanted to show herself friendly, but the only feeling most evident was her tiredness. The look told Bajesh it was not the time for pleasant conversation.

He stood and did his best to explain where he was going and what he was getting. When the flood of information got too much, he concentrated on the most important thing: that she must wait there, near the edge of the field and the forest. And she mustn't leave.

He had said a lot of things that she missed completely but he could tell by her reactions it wasn't important.

The most important thing was that she understood he would come back with more food and water.

That, and the fact he wasn't there to harm her.

After explaining where she should wait, he gently offered her his hand to help her up and led her over to a small tree just at the edge of the field. The way Taysha reached out to him without hesitation touched Bajesh deeply. He delicately led her across the small field like she was a beloved elder. Indeed, the posture of her body and scuffling feet wasn't so far off.

Bajesh sat her by a tree and showed her to use the blanket as both a mantle and cushion. He repeated her name and once more impressed on her that she was not to go away. At her nod of understanding, he ran off into the woods towards his village.

\- - - - -
As Taysha sat and waited, she revisited the whole event in her mind over and over, so as not to miss a meaning or to find something she may have misinterpreted. Mostly, she worked to keep her soul fixated on the happenings of this world. After having floated back and forth from the Door of the Afterlife in the last couple of days, she had to focus diligently to stay in one place.

The day wore on as she waited. The sky and valley started turning dark and the cold made its way down the mountain to where she sat. But the blanket kept her warm, and the gourd of water and handfuls of food had helped to lift the dark spell that had clouded her mind. Yet she sat scarred, sick, tired and in pain from head to toe. Her head still felt heavy but she had more of a sense of her surroundings and once again had that familiar desire to move to distract herself from the pain. She used the tree to help her stand and she set to walking around just inside the forest to stretch her legs and back. She found a nice, large fur tree with a low hanging branch about chest level and she instinctively started planning to build a shelter from it.

After almost making herself dizzy from walking in small circles, Taysha decided to start on that shelter. That 'Bajesh' boy was certainly taking his time, and she needed to keep her mind busy.

By the time she had constructed her semi-shelter, she was regretting having moved about at all. The original refreshing feelings of the drink and food had left her as quickly as they had arrived. She started feeling sick again. On a small pile of tree boughs, she lay half on the blanket Bajesh had brought her and used the remainder to wrap around her back. The waxy material quickly captured the heat from her legs and started warming her.

Bajesh had been gone too long for Taysha to consider he had just gone back for materials. She had probably misunderstood him or his parents had caught him.

It didn't matter either way.

She was hardly in the mood for visitors.

\- - - - -
Taysha found herself in a very quiet world, standing on the opposite side of the river from her village. The water seemed to make no sound as it flowed past. Her mother stood across from her in the place she had been killed. She looked fine, but concerned. The silence troubled Taysha. She tried to clear her ears to hear the sound of the river that flowed directly in front of her. The current was stronger and deeper than it had been on the day of the Hoorg attack. Although Taysha wanted to go to her mother, she didn't want to wade through the cold water to get to her. Not again. She could feel the pain in her legs before she even set foot in it.

"Taysha," her mother called. "Taysha!"

She looked up at her mother who was now standing farther away at the forest edge, nearer to the village.

"Taysha," she called again, sounding farther away.

Taysha's heart started pounding. Why would her mother keep going when it was obvious she could not follow?

"Taysha!"

Taysha's eyes opened from the dream in a panic that had become horribly familiar to her. The first thing she noticed was that it was night. Then came the figure at the edge of the field.

Taysha's breathing stopped as the shape of a man moved slightly, while facing towards the dark woods where she lay.

"Taysha!"

The loud whisper of a man seemed to release the air from her lungs. With a gasp of relief, she realized it was Bajesh. He was just visible in the light of the moon as he stood at the edge of the field. It looked as if he had forgotten where he left her; either that or he was just being polite and calling her so she would not be frightened. She then understood she had moved from the original spot to her new shelter.

"Leed!" she answered, her voice a cracking whisper itself. Hardly loud enough for even Taysha to hear it. She desperately needed to catch his attention before he disappeared like some vision, and her voice was not cooperating. She grabbed the corner of her shelter and gave it as firm a shake as she was able. Bajesh seemed to have heard it. He stopped moving and strained his ears towards the darkness.

"Leed!" she called to him once more and started to crawl out of her shelter.

Bajesh pushed through the surrounding bushes to find her mumbling curses to her unsupportive legs as she tried to force herself up.

"Oh, you poor thing. You poor thing." he said as he helped her to sit. Seeing she wasn't any more hurt, he proceeded to coax her back into her shelter. As he did, he admired the work she had done in a relatively short time. He put in a second blanket he brought so she could sit on one while using the other to lean back on.

"Wait here. Wait here," he motioned to her as he leaped back towards the field. He came back with a large cloth bundle, almost as wide as himself, that looked as though it was full of heavy things.

"Sorry I'm so late," he said as he sat on the ground in front of her, untying the bundle, "I had to consult with my father and after I told him all there was to tell, he wouldn't let me go without proper preparation and consulting with Mother. It is our way, you see. I know it must be difficult to wait because you are hungry but you are a wise girl and your shelter is very good. You chose a much better spot to spend the night, I see. Yes... I should have thought better of where I left you. I'm sorry. I will help you finish your shelter here..."

As he talked, he had taken out a small clay pot just big enough to hold with both hands. It was covered with a tightly tied leather cap. Bajesh crawled closer to Taysha as he continued speaking to her.

"...they said we must put more time into this _problem_ to see things more clearly. I am very sorry," he said again as he handed the clay pot to her. "Be careful. It's hot. Hot. Hot!" he emphasized by waving air into his open mouth.

Taysha felt the warmth of the pot as it travelled up her arms and chased a chill out of her. She cradled it in her lap as she took off the cap with her left hand.

Bajesh noticed her reluctance to use her right arm.

"I brought herbs and medicines as well. That will do for tonight. We'll check your sores tomorrow morning when it's light."

To Taysha, the one-sided conversation was more than just the sound of an unknown language. The boy talked in a soothing manner and it was most welcome after so many days of hearing nothing but her own voice. It was most unfortunate she didn't understand a single word. Usually there were at least a few shared words between local tribes. It had never occurred to her to learn the Traders' Tongue. That was simply a mish-mash of commonly used words of the region. Most often the easiest words to pronounce would have precedence over actual meaning. But, such things were left up to the men of the village when they met other male traders. It was another hindrance of her gender that made the corner of her upper lip curl for a moment in anger.

Still, she felt that if the boy had anything of extreme importance to share, he would take the time to communicate through gestures and repetition. For now it seemed they were both content to have him chatter in a way to sort his thoughts out for himself. Taysha was more occupied with loading the hot stew on a wooden spoon. The smell brought her mouth to water in anticipation. The heat of the mixture coupled with her sore throat caused her first attempt to end in little more than a taste. She had to sit and wait for it to cool. Bajesh noticed she was not eating as he put two gourds of water beside her.

"Not good? Bleh? Yeuk?" he asked, scrunching up his face.

At last, a common word.

"Yuk?" she repeated, "Nay," she said quietly and sleepily, while shaking her head. When he stopped and looked back at her, she dropped her gaze back at the stew. "Bodre ... bodre," she said as she held it closer to her chest to indicate she was happy with it and did not want to let it go. She held her free hand to her throat and tapped it as she made a face of pain.

"Ah. Yes. Yes. I understand," Bajesh answered, "Wait, wait. Here. Have some herbal water," he said as he pulled out a small gourd from the sack. With it, he pulled out a small leather satchel and took out what first looked like a rabbit dropping: a small, finger-rolled, pea-sized, black pellet.

He handed it to her and she instinctively put it up to her nose. It was hard and smelled of herbs. Bajesh pointed to it and made a face. "Yeuk!" he said confidently, then smiled.

"Medicine," Taysha thought, and popped it in her mouth.

At first she tasted honey but it quickly turned bitter. It was a sick bitter-sweet combination.

" _They were better to leave the honey out,"_ she thought, her face contorting and mouth opening.

Bajesh pinched his lips together; gesturing for her to keep it in her mouth. He followed that with a "Na, na" and shook his finger at her negatively. Then he started making sucking sounds at her.

"Yes? You understand? Don't chew. Good, good." He saw she understood and laughed lightly when she let out a shudder of distaste.

"Yes, they are horrible but it will heal your whole insides. From mouth to..." Bajesh hesitated and returned his focus to his task at hand. Even though he knew Taysha couldn't understand him, he was a modest young man and thought that saying, "from mouth to ass" an inappropriate thing to say to a girl.

As Taysha worked on dissolving the medicine, Bajesh laid out a large roll of twine, cloths of various shapes and textures, and small leather or cloth bundles tied with strings at the top. Most of them he had simply handed over to her, explaining what was inside them. It was meaningless to her so she put her hot soup aside as she checked each one the best she could in the dark.

The bundles contained dried berries, smoked fish, dried deer and rabbit, nuts and grains, herbs and chew-roots. There was also a large helping of a type of soft, thin bread and several pastes she concluded were to be eaten with it. He had brought enough food for several days. It was clear he wanted her to stay as long as she could.

On the ground in front of her he laid out the cloths and twine, and added two copper cooking pots and a long wooden spoon. He then pulled out a large thick, whitish fur that looked like some sort of furry goat. The bag was still half full of something but couldn't make out what it could be. Whatever it was, it was heavy.

He moved closer to her with a few more small leather packets in each hand and checked to see if she was properly sucking on the medicine. He pursed his lips like a baby sucking and she copied him. The good humour of the girl made him smile as he handed her the two packets.

"Medicines. Ointments," he said as he pointed to them. "Don't eat! No eat!" He made movements indicating eating and stomach-ache and death shown by cocking his head to the side and sticking his tongue out as he rolled his eyes in his head. Despite the seriousness of the communication, Taysha let out an involuntary snort at the efforts of this sweet boy. He smiled back then noticed her steady shivering. He would have to get a fire for her quickly.

"But first," he said to her, "It may rain again. Rain. Do you understand? Shaaaa. Pot-pot-pot."

He explained by bringing his two pointing fingers down out of the sky onto his head. Taysha looked up through her hut and realized she had failed to notice it had stopped raining. Bajesh stood and pulled a large curved knife from behind his waist and walked away from Taysha. He cut larger branches in front and around her camp area and piled them near her.

"You eat. Drink. Rest," he said as he mimed to her, "I will make your shelter better."

As she sat there, Bajesh took the whole structure apart and re-made it. Instead of a small dome, he had made it long and just high enough for her to sit with her back against the tree. Looking at the flat roof above her, Taysha figured the boy was inexperienced and told herself she would fix it later. She assumed he would fill in the long front opening later. At least, she hoped he would, as he had now apparently changed jobs to working on a fire area in front of her. She glanced around her wall-less shelter and gave him a little scolding in her head to at least finish one job before starting another. Not to mention the fire was a little too close to the shelter for her comfort. But she was in no position to argue, even in her own language. She decided to trust him. Anyway, she could always change things to her liking after he left.

Then gradually, as she sat and watched him, the reasoning behind his actions became apparent.

Bajesh put rocks on the bottom of the fire to keep it off the wet ground. Then he made a crescent of rocks behind it before piling up thick, wet logs above them to dry and to direct the heat towards her. He had pulled out a night's worth of dry firewood from his big bag and asked Taysha which side of the shelter she would lay her head. He then placed a waxy fabric just outside the hut and put the wood on it neatly before wrapping it with the cloth. He had brought enough dry wood to guarantee her a warm and safe night's sleep.

As he started to prepare the fire for her, Taysha sat there in the dark of her new shelter silently staring at this unexpected gift from the Goddess. It was all so ... so much of everything and tears started to form. Taysha allowed herself this indulgence because they were tears of joy, rather than self-pity.

Bajesh quickly had the fire going and went to hand the flint set to Taysha. He noticed her crying as she took it. He didn't really know what to do about it, so he continued on with his duties. He took one of the long, heavy cloths and sat it on the top of her shelter. It went up one side, straight over the roof, and almost to the ground by the end where her feet were to go. He went back over to the cloth bag that he had used to bring everything in, and unravelled it into a large, rectangular piece. He stood shaking out the bits of wood that were stuck on it, when a male voice called out from the field.

"Bajesh a!"

The sudden intrusion to the silence made Taysha jump.

"N'ha!" Bajesh answered back to the voice.

"Oovoral o," the voice called back and Bajesh motioned to Taysha to stay where she was, then bounded out to the clearing.

Despite Bajesh's calm reaction to the voice, Taysha started to shake violently at the low mumblings of an adult male speaking.

In a short time Bajesh came back holding a javelin-sized spear. "Look. Look at this!" he said smiling as he took the hardened leather cap off and showed her an iron tip.

"It's from Father. It's for you. Here. It's for you."

Bajesh handed her the spear that just fit lengthwise in her shelter.

She looked back at Bajesh in confirmation that she understood it was for her. His smile and nod of approval told her it was.

An iron tipped spear. No girl in her village had ever had one. It would have been considered a waste of valuable metals.

"Wolves," Bajesh said with a growl, "Maybe wolves. arRRuuh!" he added, impersonating a howling wolf, "You understand, yes. This is for you. From my father."

He moved his attention back to the rectangular cloth piece as Taysha laid her spear across her lap with the tip end close enough so she could touch it. She guided the fingers of her sprained hand over the cold metal as she took sips from her stew. The stew was still hot but drinkable. She welcomed the change of taste from the sickeningly bittersweet tablet. There was something different about the meal. It contained different spices than what Taysha was used to.

Suddenly it came painfully clear that the heat of the stew, was not only from the fire.

Taysha's eyes bulged wide and she started panting through her mouth. The intake of air seemed to make the growing heat in her mouth worse. Poison? Why would he do such a terrible thing now after all this good? No, that didn't make any sense. Maybe she was ill in some strange way.

Taysha looked up at him pleadingly, asking with her eyes what sort of mischief he had done. Bajesh noticed her and laughed lightly as he leaned over to her.

"Spicy?" he caught her worried eyes. She was so cute and adorable. "You poor thing," he said with a laugh. He reached over and pulled out some of the thin bread.

"Here, eat this. It will make it better."

She stuck the whole piece in her mouth, still looking at him with eyes that sought and end to this horrible torture. But her plea was only greeted by more gentle laughter.

"Yes. It is spicy. Spicy. I am sorry. Poor girl..." he went to tap her on the knee to console her but his hand fluttered indecisively, wondering whether he should touch her or not. He stood quickly and turned back to putting on the last part of the shelter.

The sting of the hot spices subsided and Taysha tried her stew again, instantly wondering what possessed her to do so. She grabbed for more bread. The unfamiliar warmth seemed to permeate through her. She felt it on different parts of her body but mostly in her throat and mouth. She did notice, however, that it helped chase out the cold. Or perhaps it was simply the fire. After all, it was close enough that she could touch it if she stretched out past the hut opening. To her right was the pile of extra wood also within reaching distance. Taysha was worried about its close proximity, but she was just too tired to do anything about it.

Bajesh's crotch stepped in between Taysha and the view of the fire. _"What is this guy doing?"_ she thought as she modestly pulled away. It seemed he was simply taking far too long to lay yet another layer of cloth onto her shelter. Then, suddenly, he stepped aside and the fabric flopped down in front of Taysha giving her a start, and cutting her off completely from the heat and light. After a little rustling, as Bajesh fastened the cloth securely, he pulled it open from the bottom and folded it back over onto the roof. A flood of warmth hit Taysha and seemed to fill the shelter from end to end.

Bajesh leaned down to look inside. Apparently Taysha wore a very confused look on her face, because the young man started smiling once more.

"Sorry. Sorry," he said again, "Here, look at this..."

He turned around and grabbed a lit stick from the fire and pulled down a bit of the fabric from the top. Touching the fiery end to the cloth he said, "See? See? It won't burn. Good? Yes? Well ... it doesn't burn easily anyway," he added, brushing off a small ember that had stuck to the cloth, "Safe sleeping. Better than just pine trees."

Taysha reached up and touched the cloth. It had the same waxy feel to it. Now she understood. She could use the fire to heat the entire inside of her hut, not just at the feet or at the head but from head to feet. Then she could close in the heat with the fabric wall before she slept. The roof was too high for her liking, though. It was comfortable to sit in but the height would add more air to heat than a lower roof. She figured she would add in more pine branches later.

This thought, like such others, soon became needless.

Bajesh had disappeared, and by the sound of it, was cutting branches around the area. Just as Taysha was about to fall asleep, he appeared and shooed her outside so he could prepare her bed.

Taysha instantly noticed the difference in temperature. The air around her told her winter had now completely moved into the lands and she stood with her first blanket around her shoulders as she watched Bajesh work.

He layered the bottom with more pine branches, which Taysha was thankful for. She was a little concerned at him having taken so many from the same tree, though. She hoped the spirits of the tree wouldn't hold her responsible for it. On the branches he put the first cloth he had given her and then laid out the second on top of it, finishing with the thick, white fur for her head to rest on. He then kindly helped the shivering girl inside.

As Taysha got comfortable, Bajesh opened the cloths containing medicines. He showed her the contents of one, pointing to the scratches on her body. Taysha took the opportunity to take off her bear fur mantle and pull her winter tunic sleeve up to show him her badly infected arm. The look of surprise on his face worried her a bit. She caught herself feeling self-conscience about her looks. She figured she was a horrific sight.

Bajesh applied the pasty substance to her arm while saying something or another before gently applying it to the other cuts and scrapes on her arms. Though this foreign _boy_ , was adept at making shelters, Taysha had doubts of his skills as a Healer. He seemed dreadfully uneasy at touching her in any way, and most of the ointment was simply dabbed on rather than rubbed in. When he had finished he took out a clump of brown, clay-like substance from the assortment of goods he had brought. He leaned over and pulled one of the copper pots near him.

"This. Water. Fire. Boil. Bok-bok-bok. Boil. Cloth." He grabbed a cloth from the small pile by her feet. "Then you wrap your wrist and also your neck. Don't eat this or you'll..."

He stopped himself from talking in full sentences and returned to step-by-step instructions as he held each item in his hand.

"Water. Water," he said as he held up one of the gourds, noticing it was empty already.

"Ah. Yes. You will need more water. Over there. Water. See? Over there." He pointed into the darkness in the opposite direction of the field and made the motions of a running river with his hand and fingers.

" _River. Understand..."_ Taysha thought with a nod to him. She vaguely remembered a small creek to the right on her descent from the pass.

Bajesh sat for a moment staring into space. He realized he had done all he could. He wasn't sure if he should just apply the herbal mixture to her wrist for her. She would possibly be grateful but he didn't want her to think all his actions were just to touch her. She might get mad at him. It seemed better to leave so she could administer her own treatment and get some sleep.

"Well ... I should go. I will go. I go. Back ... to village. Sleep. All right?" he was answered with a single nod of understanding from Taysha. The nod came from her rather quickly, which disappointed him. He was kind of hoping she would at least ask him not to go. He would have been happy to bring his sleeping cloak and stay by the fire. He thought of giving her his knife, but the uneasy feeling she would not be there in the morning persuaded him not to. If she hadn't left in the morning then she probably would when she had recovered. At least she now had a javelin to protect herself with.

"I will be ... I. Come. Tomorrow. Tomorrow. One sleep. Yes? You understand?" he confirmed.

Taysha nodded again and he took a deep breath and checked the camp area. He was content he had communicated all that was needed to and he had done all that he could do. He smiled at her and gave a cute wobble of his head as if to say, _"I guess that's it then."_.

Bajesh looked back before moving out of sight and held his hand up in silent parting. She answered him likewise and he started on the roundabout route home to avoid being seen by others. He felt as though his soul was being pulled backwards, back to the fascinating, wild girl. His heart was telling him to just get his cloak and go back to her, but he was a modest boy, and he returned home for the night.

\- - - - -

That night Taysha piled the firewood high – a little too high in fact. It was so hot in that open hut that she started sweating. But, she didn't mind one bit.

Thanks to her rest, food, comfort and safety, her mind was able to focus on other matters. Most importantly was the stink that surrounded her. Every little breeze would bring wafts of stomach turning odours from different parts of her body to her most unfortunate nose.

Knowing the foreign boy would return in the morning, she could stand it no longer.

The first thing she did was remove her shoes. Her feet were not in good shape. They looked bad and smelled bad. She was glad the boy had left her now, although she had a feeling he was lingering in the dark shadows, spying on her. With the fire so bright in her eyes, he could have been standing within spitting-distance for all she knew. The thought came and went as she undressed and sat naked by the fire.

The smell coming up from between her legs made her turn her head to the side. Even the smell from under her arms was different from usual. It was almost a rotting odour that made her want to hide under her tunic once more. She opened her body wide enough to allow the heat and wind to reach her. Even if she was being watched, it was a trivial matter at this point.

"Let him look. I don't care."

She picked up a spare cloth and the last gourd of water.

"Stupid," she berated herself, "I should have got the boy to go fill the other ones before he left."

Her throat started hurting again, and it made her notice how much time had passed since it had bothered her.

" _Must be that medicine."_ she thought as she leaned over and took another one of the pellets from the satchel. "Yeuk," she said, imitating the boy's accent. There was a slight fondness in repeating their first and only common word.

She popped the bitter pill in her mouth and spent the remainder of her waking hours washing herself the best she could. Her clothes still stank, but at least now they were warm. Her tunic hugged her body happily as she put it back on.

With the last of the water, she made the soup-like medicine that the boy had instructed to put on her wrist and neck. Why her neck? Taysha didn't know, but felt that under the circumstances it best she just trust him.

The concoction looked like watery clay, but smelled like something she could eat. Taysha was thankful the boy had instructed her not to eat it. Otherwise she might have taken a taste or two.

With the warm mixture of herbs on her wrist and neck, Taysha put on a couple of extra dabs of ointment on her sores.

She then gingerly crawled into bed, being careful not to wipe it all off between the blankets.

The smell of the unsoiled material quickly made the odour of her hair apparent. She took a piece of string from the supplies and attempted to tie her hair up in a bun. It was almost impossible with her injured hand, but she persevered through the seemingly unimportant task. There was just something about it that made Taysha feel she must finish. Perhaps it was an act of retaking her humanity, a sense of decorum. Maybe it was simply to make herself more presentable to the foreign boy when he returned. Regardless, she persevered until the painful task was done.

She then closed the tent flap, trapping the heat inside.

It was almost too hot for her at first. She propped up the corner of the flap with a stick to let in some cool air. Again she marvelled at the shelter's brilliant design. Unfortunately it held in her stink as well. She told herself if she wasn't going to die, then she should at least have a bath. Maybe the boy would help her make a decent Amazoi bathing pool.

"The boy..." Taysha repeated her thoughts out loud with an added _tsk_ at her rudeness, "Ba-jesh," she let the name of her saviour roll off her tongue, "Bajesh..."

\- - - - -
"Hey, so you've got yourself a barbarian girl, I hear," Bajesh's big brother whispered in his ear.

Bajesh hadn't even woken yet. He rolled over and gave a look of rebuke to his overly-free sibling. "Dad won't let me go and see." Brother continued, "I can't imagine why." he cooed with a sly look over at their father. The man, used to his elder son's games, politely ignored the look and continued eating his breakfast.

"Is she all right?" Bajesh's mother asked simply, yet quietly enough to keep her voice within the hut.

"I think so," Bajesh answered pushing himself up, and subtly covering the bulge of his _Morning Greeting_. "She does have a bad sore on her arm ... and I think her wrist is sprained."

"Did you apply the ointments?" Mother asked.

"Where I could," he replied with some embarrassment.

"Good for you." His grandmother added, as she handed him a bowl of breakfast stew.

"She doesn't know our ways." Brother interjected, "What if she eats it? She could get really sick, you know."

"Yes. I know. It's one of the first things I told her."

"She speaks our language then?" Brother added in that tone of voice that let Bajesh know he was just baiting him.

"No," Bajesh answered, his voice trailing off as he recalled their limited communication. "She knows 'yeuck', but that's about it."

"Yeuck," mimicked Brother as the family chuckled.

"Yeah. She didn't take to the stew ... too spicy for her."

"It's no wonder," Father followed, "Our spices aren't originally from around here."

"But she understood everything," Bajesh continued, "She's really very bright. She had made a simple shelter in the time I went to get supplies."

"She would have to be bright to make it over that mountain," Father replied, "There's no tribes we know of past there. At least, not within a week's walk."

"You know," Brother added in between mouthfuls of egg, "if we learn bits of her language and find out where she came from, we could make an ally. They would be grateful if we brought her back."

It was a good thought.

"Unless she was driven from her tribe," Mother mentioned, "A sin. A transgression of some kind."

"Maybe she had two sexual partners!" Brother ribbed Bajesh with wide, comical eyes, catching a "that's enough" look from Mother.

"All right, all right," Brother gave in before he could be rebuked, "but it is worth an effort, I would think, and it would be a good titbit for the Council to chew on. They wouldn't refuse something that could benefit the whole tribe ... possibly."

"Yes, possibly," Father continued, "but there is the chance, however grateful her tribe would be, that they are not a peaceful people and we could bring in more trouble than good."

Brother raised his eyebrows and returned to his stew.

"Not that it isn't a good idea," Father said, "but we would be wise to consider what the other council members would say."

"No, that's fine," said Brother. "I didn't think you were putting me down. I was thinking more of the fact you were right. Even if her tribe is friendly, they would tell others of where we are and that could be dangerous. Some of them, out there, are the ones that ambushed our people."

"That was south of here," Father corrected.

"Still..." Brother defended his argument with a slight head-wobble, "I'm just thinking that eventually everyone in the village will be over there when someone finds her."

In a moment of seriousness, Brother turned to Bajesh, "And, someone _will_ find her."

Bajesh let his desire to keep her to himself show a little as he looked sullenly into his bowl.

"Well," Mother answered on his behalf, "most people think that she went off to die and no one wants to come across the body of one parted, lest her soul mingle with theirs."

"Especially one of unknown origin," added Grandmother.

"Yes. Especially that," continued Mother, "You said she's at the Old Field?"

"Yes," answered Bajesh.

"Well, I don't think anyone will be around there after Tapan's suicide. There's no telling what spirit lingers there."

Mother noticed the worry on Bajesh's face and added, "Don't worry. She's of different blood and soul. _He_ can't harm her."

Bajesh's parents weren't so confined to the tribal beliefs as some of the others were, but that didn't mean everything he had heard wasn't true. The thought of the spirit of old-man Tapan, hanging around looking for a soul to latch on to, was not a nice one to start the day with. He told himself he would have to watch Taysha to see if she started to talk to herself, or curse indiscriminately, or show other signs of insanity.

"Yeah..." Brother suddenly said out loud, "and if we don't let people know she's in our care, they might kill her. And she wouldn't know why because we helped her... then all of a sudden someone comes out and kills her."

"Well now," said Father, "I don't see anyone from our village just going and killing the girl. And we can't just up and start telling people that we're taking care of an outsider, but they should mind their own business." He stopped himself as he noticed the look of despair on his younger son's face.

"Hear me now. I'll talk to Anami. That will ensure the safety of the girl. From there we will take each step carefully as it is placed before us. Good?"

"Good," repeated all, except for Grandmother. Not because she didn't agree but because she had passed the age to be vocal about these things. By the end of the day tomorrow, all the grey-haired ones would know about the wild girl camped near the Old Field. And each of them would hold their tongues in so far as telling the younger ones about it. Such troubles were for the young to figure out on their own.

"Did she tell you her age?" Mother asked.

"No. We don't speak the same language, Mother," Bajesh answered, slightly annoyed at having to say the obvious.

"About how old do you think? Were her breasts developed?"

Bajesh's face went red.

"Yeah... I'd guess she's about 16 years."

"Hmm."

"Why?"

"Oh. No reason. Just wondering," she concluded as she helped her husband's mother gather the dishes and bring them outside to wash.

"Quite an adventure. Quite an adventure," Brother said slyly as he laid back next to Father, "Is she pretty?"

"Yes," Bajesh answered, surprising himself in his lack of hesitation.

"Big boobs?"

"Average... I guess."

Bajesh slipped inside his mind as he recalled how she looked in the dancing light of the fire. In the lengthy silence, Brother and Father looked at each other knowingly, and it brought Bajesh out of his daydreams. "I don't know... But she's really sick now. Coughing. And her throat was hurting. And her wrist is really swollen."

Brother gave a mocking look of shared pain, and received the back hand of Father across the chest for it. It didn't stop Brother from smiling and wagging his head at Bajesh.

"You've done all you can," Father consoled, "Leave it to the gods to bring her through the test she has been chosen to endure. It's apparent she has been brought here for some purpose."

Bajesh sat quietly and thought of Father's last comment.

"Tay-sha. TAY sha. Taysha," he whispered so he wouldn't forget her name. Yes. She was pretty, even as dirty and tired as she was. He so wanted to see what she looked like when she had regained her health.

He could only dare hope that she would stay that long.

The time for talking had ended, and Father rose to his feet. Brother followed him out the hut, talking loudly about Bajesh farting in his sleep. It was an over-obvious attempt at showing whoever was outside, that they had not been talking about secrets. Still, Brother had to be a pest in doing even that. Bajesh scowled at the closing wooden door before grabbing his clothes and a bag of food.

"Wait a moment," Mother said as he stepped outside, "I want to bring something to the girl this morning."

"Uh..." The suddenness of the decision surprised him. "What? You want to come with me?" he whispered.

"Yes, won't be a moment," she answered, and ducked back inside. Bajesh wasn't sure if he felt pleased, or threatened, to have the support of his mother.

He really didn't want to share Taysha with the rest of the tribe, not yet at least. After all, it was he who went after her while the rest of them just let her go to die.

"How long?" he asked.

"Two blinks," she said, using her favourite phrase.

Bajesh used the time to wash his face in the clay water-jar that sat outside the hut. He took a cup and added a herbal mix from a small bag under the water-jar. He gargled and spat it out nearby.

"Morning!" A fellow villager greeted him as he walked past with a bird net over his shoulder.

"Good morning," Bajesh answered with a glance upwards.

This early in the morning it was always hard to tell if it was a clear sky or just a seamless cloud. Bajesh was pretty sure it was clear and it would start turning blue as the sun came up over the mountains. His mother stepped out of the hut and handed him a large piece of smoked deer. He took it, and quickly hid it under his coat while looking around suspiciously.

"Come on." Mother said calmly as she stated walking, "Let's go before everyone is up and starts annoying us."

She picked up an empty basket that was leaning against their hut and threw some things into it.

"In case anyone asks, we're going to find mushrooms," she said as she caught Bajesh's nervous look.

But the village populace was too busy getting themselves ready for the day to notice the mother and son head off into the woods. They were combing their hair and rinsing mouths and borrowing or trading eggs or breads for breakfast. Some fed the noisy geese as others fed the noisy sheep. Neighbours greeted each other as they walked by or stood stretching outside their homes. In a short while the village circle would be alive with scents and smells to melt the mouth and rumble the belly.

When Bajesh and Mother had reached the Old Field, Bajesh was pleased to notice the girl's shelter was well hidden from anyone who might walk past. The brush at the edge of the field made a wall that naturally led travellers towards the eastern mountain. He led his mother through by slipping under a low-hanging pine bough.

It was like stepping into a secret room. Taysha's camp was a mix of evergreens and those that had shed their summer foliage. The trees were spaced enough to provide a good deal of light, while offering protection from wind and rain. Mother stood looking around, seeming to be pleased with the spot he had chosen for the girl.

"Wait here," Bajesh said to her and walked quietly towards Taysha's covered hut. His mother indulged him and gave him the leadership of the situation.

"Taysha? Taysha," he called quietly from what he thought was a respectful distance. He noticed the fire was still smoking lightly. He gave a cough to clear his throat and called again. A rustle of movement came from within and the girl meekly peeked out into the brightness. She looked worse in the daylight as she squinted and tried to focus on her guests. She smiled as best she could to indicate all was well and struggled to get out.

Bajesh looked over to his mother with a _"See how bad she is?"_ look on his face. His mother immediately started walking towards the shelter. She knelt down beside Taysha's to help lift the heavy matting off her and up onto the roof. Bajesh stood by, jealously wanting to protect his precious find, but the way Mother was checking Taysha's forehead, he could see something was not right.

"Get the fire going," Mother said over her shoulder.

She knew the young girl's temperature needed prompt attention. She asked Bajesh to fetch water and firewood as Taysha lay inhaling deeply through her nose. Mother noticed that the girl was inhaling the scent of her perfumed hair. Perhaps because of the fatigue and sickness, she lay innocently examining Mother's face. She seemed to take a particular interest in the shiny metal that pierced the side of Mother's nose.

With calming words, Mother started to inspect Taysha. Then she helped re-organise Taysha's bed and sat out of the way so the heat could radiate into her shelter. All the while she talked steadily as if Taysha understood every word. Bajesh interrupted her when he could to attempt to translate in hand gestures.

"Mother, she doesn't understand," he instructed, "One thing at a time. That's not important right now. Stick to topics worth translating."

Mother ignored his instruction and kept talking until Taysha had stopped shaking in the warmth of the blankets and then she turned to Bajesh.

"She'll need another fur. Maybe a bear fur..." she said half to herself, then looking at Bajesh she added, "She must wash." Mother turned to Taysha, "YOU MUST WASH," she said louder as if that would somehow drive the message in. Taysha just looked back like a newborn baby.

"Talking loudly doesn't help, Mother. Show her actions. She's not stupid."

"YOU. HAVE TO. TAKE A. BATH." she repeated loudly with exaggerated facial expressions, running her hands quickly all over her body to imitate a person bathing.

"Mother, you're just confusing her. Don't use different words all of a sudden. It makes it sound as though you're saying two different things."

He came closer and tapped Taysha lightly on the shoulder. Now her attention was divided between him and this woman dancing or whatever it was she was doing, as she yelled at her rather comically.

"Taysha, look," he said simply as he held up the now empty gourd. "Water. You understand water?" as he pretended to drink. She nodded her head. He then held the gourd over a cloth to make show as if the water was running onto it before moving the cloth around his body as he rubbed around with his other hand. "Bathe. You must bathe, yes?"

Taysha understood and nodded. She had no energy to argue that it was probably her clothes that stunk more now.

"Good. Well done," said Bajesh's mother as she stood, "Set to heating some water, Bajesh. I'm going to get..." and here she directed her sentence to Taysha, "I'M GOING TO GET SOAP. SOAP! Um. Oh, Bajesh, you tell her I'm going to get soap."

With that she turned to go back to the village.

Taysha looked to Bajesh for an indication of what was happening. All he could offer through his embarrassment was a bit of a scowl in the direction of his mother. She didn't get far though. She made it to the bushes by the field before raising her hand and heading back to the basket.

"Almost forgot. Here. I don't know if she needs them now. But she will eventually."

Mother held out to Bajesh what Taysha could only think was a collective. It was a small woven, dark brown material, sewn in a flat shape, with a cloth belt that most likely went under and around the hips to hold it in place. Bajesh didn't say anything but just sat there staring at it. Mother rolled her eyes, sighed at her infantile son, and stepped over to hand it directly to Taysha.

Taysha felt an unspoken bonding to the woman. Not knowing why, her eyes got watery as she nodded in agreement and took the simple gift.

"Good, Good. I thought so," Mother said, a little taken aback by the poor girl's tears. Then her gaze dropped to Taysha's neck.

"Tsk. She doesn't even have a scarf. You didn't bring her a scarf?" she asked her son.

"I ... Uh ... didn't want to bring anything you would miss."

"What? Don't be stupid. You have an armful of them. Poor thing. She must have lost hers," she added as she started walking towards the field. "I'm going to get the soap!"

"Maybe her tribe doesn't use scarves!" Bajesh yelled back at her. His slight look of contempt softened when he noticed Taysha looking at him with questioning eyes.

"Don't be silly!" Mother yelled back as she started her little run, "Everyone uses scarves!"

Looking at Taysha, Bajesh shook his head in mild abandon, "Ah ... my mother. Ma. My MaMa."

"Mama," Taysha repeated with a wipe of her eye and a smile.

They had found their second word.

\- - - - -
By the time he heard Mother's footsteps, Bajesh had collected more wood, refilled the gourds and re-applied the heated ointments on Taysha's cloths. Taysha had eaten and had a hot herb drink before going to the toilet and crawling back under the blankets. He now stood with an armful of wood just within view of Taysha as he watched Mother cut through the wall of grass dividing the forest from the shelter, huffing and puffing, with her hands full of things.

"Mother! What are you doing?" Bajesh scolded, pointing behind her. She turned around confused, wondering what on earth the problem was. He was concerned that she had just made a clear path to Taysha's camp. Before he could express it in words, his mother made the face that showed she wasn't in the mood for dealing with anything else than what she was working on.

So Bajesh stood quietly with his mouth hanging open as she pushed her way through and over to where Taysha lay.

"Sorry I'm so late. I just kept thinking of things to bring," she said as she dropped a digging spade and a small axe before bringing the basket closer to Taysha.

"Whew! Then the neighbours ... what a bother! Well, in honesty, I haven't had this much fun for quite some time!"

She smiled at Taysha, who was still looking none too well. Her condition calmed Mother down and she looked at Taysha as she pulled out a finer woven cloth.

"What's her name?"

"Taysha," answered Bajesh as he joined them.

"Ta-sha," repeated Mother with a smile to the girl.

"Tay-sha," Taysha gently corrected and smiled back.

"Tay-sha, of course. Tay-sha," Mother corrected herself and smiled over to Bajesh. "Oh! Your father talked to Anami. They will do the usual gathering of Allies before they 'attack' the Council." Mother made big eyes when she said the word _attack_. She always enjoyed the political battles of the village.

Bajesh hated it all, but very much admired both his parents for the way they played the game. In his opinion, the two sides of every issue were always too intense and rather stupid. There was a Council but it seemed the members thought it their duty was to simply refute and debate any idea that was presented them, no matter how good or proper.

Even the sensible people who became council members turned as daft as their predecessors. "Council Sickness" was the private jest. The whole process of finding a problem, presenting solutions, and arguing over each one had become an accepted order of decision-making for Bajesh's people.

It was in the hands of such that Taysha's fate now lay.

"Here's the soap and I brought you two scarves," Mother said as she handed Taysha a bar of hardened brown paste. It had a mint smell just like the Amazoi used for bathing. Mother then pulled out two fabrics. One was so thin Taysha could see through it. She was very happy to hold something like this. In her village, only two women had material of the like. They got it from their husbands who had accidentally run into another hunting party and had done some on-the-spot quick trades. Now Taysha had one even better. It was the length from shoulder to wrist, about as wide as her body, and decorated with small, soft pieces of metal. The second was simpler in design but made of thicker cloth and was twice as long.

"This is for the summer." Mother explained, as Taysha admired the gifts, "I know it's a long way off but it's good to have a spare." Mother took her winter scarf off to show Taysha the different uses. She put it across her folded legs and pretended to eat off it, "Num Num" she said as she pretended to eat. "See? It's a table."

"Nom Nom," Taysha repeated in her version of the words.

"Good, yes." Mother replied, joyfully thinking she was actually teaching the girl her language, "And for after washing..." she picked up the scarf and pretended to dry herself, "A towel! And when sleeping ... a pillow. Or for when your hair is wet... or when cold ... over the head," Mother continued as she put her scarf back around her neck and pulled it over her head, "And for praying ... but that depends on your beliefs, I suppose."

Mother's voice trailed off as she pulled out a couple of satchels of a fragrant, creamy substance.

"After bathing. You put this one in your ... well, down there," she pointed directly between her own legs while she curled up two fingers.

Taysha's face went red.

" _Inside?"_ she thought. _"Oh gods. I bet I stink something horrible to her."_

"And here as well, if you like." Mother lifted her arms and pretended to rub a little under her arms.

She then took the second packet that was larger than the two. Taysha recognized the smell as the perfume coming from the woman's hair. Sure enough, Mother motioned to take some in her hand, put it in her hair and douse it with water.

Taysha nodded weakly but she had never been too thrilled at the idea of putting water on her head in the winter. Even so, her eyes lingered on the woman's hair. It wasn't the typical greasy, matted sort of her people. Come to think of it, neither was Bajesh's.

Mother also pulled out ointments that were familiar to Taysha. They were the three that Bajesh had brought her last night. Taysha held out her bandaged wrist to show she already knew their uses. Mother took Taysha's arm lightly and smelled the medicine on the cloth. She sat back surprised that her little boy knew enough to bring the medicine.

"Good. Good. Let's check the rest of your body. Did you, Bajesh? Check every thing else?"

Bajesh shook his head adamantly.

"Let's see ... off with the cloth." She motioned for Taysha to sit up and take off her tunic. Taysha looked at Bajesh for explanation, but his turning his back to her and tending the fire seemed to tell her that she understood correctly.

Taysha was a bit surprised at Bajesh's embarrassment. After all, there was a difference between _seeing_ , and _looking_. It was rather strange the boy made such an effort not to even be able to see her. She reminded herself that the different tribes would have different customs and ideas about what is proper and what is not.

Taysha sat up wearily. She knew she wasn't in a condition to argue regardless. She pulled off her tunic and the cold day invaded her senses. Mother made a quick check making tsk-tsk sounds at her condition. The sore on her arm was as long as her thumb and had spots of blood just under the wet area.

In honesty, Taysha's greatest concern over taking off her tunic was the fear this woman would come to the conclusion the wound would have to be healed by fire.

The quick check was soon over and Mother took the bowl of hot water from beside the fire. She added the herbal soap and placed the bowl in front of her and washed Taysha's back with a warm, damp cloth.

The rubbing felt soothing and Taysha was happy to sit there while Mother washed, dried and rubbed oil over her back, and applied ointments to unseen blemishes and scratches. The oil gave Taysha a tingling feeling and smelled of mint and some unrecognisable herbs. Mother then handed the cloth to Taysha to finish herself , then turned her attention to the basket of foods to start making something to eat.

The mother and son sat with their backs to Taysha with enough space to let the heat in between them while giving her enough privacy to finish washing. Mother snuck glances over her shoulder from time to time to check if the young girl had finished.

Taysha's movement was slow and deliberate, which was quite understandable in her condition. Though having to strip and wash yet again was uncomfortable at first, Taysha was thankful for chance to wash properly. At least, more properly than the night before. What she really needed was to soak in an Amazoi pool.

When she had finished, Mother turned to her before she could dress and helped tend to the sore on her arm, and the bruises on her side and legs. She then started to untie the leather string that was bound in Taysha's single braid from her temple but Taysha reached up and stopped her. Taysha just sat holding the thin braid tightly as she looked at Mother silently for a moment. Even if they spoke the same language, Taysha would not have been able to vocalize the importance of the braid without becoming overwhelmed. Before her emotions could engulf her, Taysha looked solemnly back at the fire. Mother quickly assumed the braid had some sort of religious meaning. She apologized and made motions that she would not touch it again.

Mother asked about the string that held up her bun. Taysha gave a series of slight nods, and Mother set to work, fluffing Taysha's hair out around her shoulders.

The smell of unkempt hair encircled them.

For a moment, Taysha sat wondering if the woman was planning on dumping water on her head right there. She looked sideways through the mass of hair to see Mother putting a large amount of the scented ointment into her hands and start rubbing it into Taysha's scalp. Mother then took the drying cloth and rubbed it in further. When Mother stood and waved out the cloth, Taysha realized that was her bath. She ran her fingers through her hair. It was as smooth as if she had been swimming all day.

Now the gentle mixture of pleasant smells seemed to vie for position as they wafted around her and her shelter.

Mother pulled and twisted Taysha's hair firmly into a bun and re-tied it with a new leather piece with a string attached to it. She then took out a simple white tunic and handed it to Taysha.

"Give me your pants and shirt and I'll wash them today."

Taysha showed obvious hesitation at giving the woman her only clothes in exchange for a thin tunic. Bajesh took the time to explain that what she had received was for sleeping in, and that Mother would wash and bring her clothes back dried the next morning. Though unsure, Taysha relented. Mother took the stained and dirtied clothes and dropped them into her now empty basket.

"Don't worry," Mother assured with a smile at Taysha, "Bathe. Dry. Ointments. Now, rest."

Taysha lay down enjoying her new smells and the comfort of her bed while Mother went back to preparing her stew and talking quietly with Bajesh.

Before Taysha drifted back to sleep, her eyes fell on the digging spade. She told herself that when she got better, she would build a proper bath.

An Amazoi bath...

Yes.

It would be her gift to these people before she left to die.

\- - - - -
When Taysha woke, it was well past midday. Bajesh's mother had gone with her basket and Bajesh sat idly poking at the fire. He greeted her with a big smile that made her smile in return. He offered her some stew but her sore throat prompted her to refuse. She took another one of those awful tasting medicines in the meantime and it made her stomach grumble. She needed to shit, but she wanted to do it after Bajesh had left.

So she waited.

Mother had brought two fresh eggs with her that Taysha ate raw. Taysha sat wishing she had more. She loved eggs. They were a specialty in her tribe. None of the Amazoi had caught on to the idea of keeping birds for the sake of a continuous food source. She vaguely remembered the sound of geese when she had first stumbled into the village. They would be a great warning cry in lieu of dogs. Taysha knew enough of the animals to know they would certainly attack anything that came near them.

Taysha propped herself up on one arm and her head was already starting to droop. Bajesh noticing her discomfort and suggested Taysha sleep again. With her back and shoulder feeling sore it sounded like a good idea and she lay down. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the boy looking at her from time to time as he added various roots and other dried foodstuff not recognized by Taysha in a pot. The exotic smell of the cooking was undoubtedly another spicy meal. Taysha dreaded having to eat another one, but the eggs had revived her appetite and she was looking forward to filling her belly sometime later ... when Bajesh had left. In the meantime, she would just rest her eyes...

Before she knew it, Bajesh's mother was waking her as Bajesh stood behind the fire, hoisting up Taysha's wet pants and tunic to dry.

"You must eat," said his mother as she gently helped Taysha up. The unwelcome cold on her warmed back and sides made her want to slump back into her bed like a selfish child. But she knew it was time to move. She needed to work her circulation and stretch her muscles or she would feel far, far worse.

She looked up at Bajesh, and they seemed to share a moment of unspoken connection. It was broken as Mother handed Taysha a wooden bowl of stew.

Bajesh went back to putting more wood on the fire and arranging the cooking pot that now had a wooden lid on it.

Taysha noticed he looked sad in a way. It was the look of a child whose power and authority had been usurped by a parent. Taysha understood the feeling well.

She decided she must make an effort to communicate with him more. She didn't want him to go and have new people come and flock around her, asking questions like a bunch of old women and pestering her.

She liked Bajesh. He had a comfortable pace about him. His mother was very nice and all, but she left Taysha feeling a bit like jumping into a strong river current. Perhaps Mother's character was better suited for her when she was in better health. Even so, Taysha was amazed at how they got along so well without a shared language.

The two women, younger and older from completely different worlds, who had been separated by a valley and a mountain, sat side by side as Taysha ate the meal offered her. She was very pleased to find it wasn't spicy, but she did notice some meat she did not recognise.

Mother saw her playing at it with her spoon and leaned back into her shelter and patted the sheepskin Taysha had been using as a pillow. Taysha looked at it and back to the woman with a shake of her head. She didn't know the animal. But she did know it was warm to sleep on and tasty to eat.

After she had finished, Mother prompted her to stand and stretch. She pointed deeper into the forest, saying something that Bajesh helped communicate to be the river. They helped Taysha up and into her bear-fur mantle and wrapped her winter scarf around her neck and head. Bajesh handed her the short spear to use as a crutch and he followed a couple steps behind, swinging a stick at the bushes as he walked.

The river was a little farther than Taysha had imagined. Not a tiring walk by any means, just enough to loosen the legs and back. Bajesh's mother walked slowly and carefully beside her as they went in no particular hurry. Taysha quickly understood the purpose was to get her moving and stretching her legs. The river itself was very low, and there were no fish, but Taysha was already mapping out an area she could start to dig a pool for a bath.

She would then fill it with rocks and add trenches to and from the river to divert of the flow of fresh water. Beside it would be space enough for the fire to heat the rocks.

Mother decided they had walked enough and motioned they should return. At the camp, Mother checked that there was enough wood by Taysha's shelter and her attention went to the fabric rolled up on the roof. She pulled it out and fastened the ends up on two sticks to catch more of the heat and act as an extended cover in case it rained. Doing so also kept the outside of the fabric facing up and the inside of the flap warmed. Taysha once again thought the simple design brilliant. Having it rolled up on top would make for an uncomfortable night when it had been raining, as the wet side would end up facing the occupant when closed. Now Taysha only needed to pick up the sticks at the bottom and bring them down to her bedside to close her _door_.

The three of them sat together and drank a warm spiced drink. The chill from getting out into the early winter day was once again chased away. Mother looked up at the sky to check the time. She said many things to Taysha and Bajesh, to which Bajesh just nodded.

She patted Taysha's knee and stood to collect her basket and other things. When she was ready, she looked back at Taysha with sorrowful eyes as if to say she wished they could communicate. She gave Taysha a half smile and Taysha smiled back in understanding and gratitude. With a slight wobble of her head, Mother turned and left, leaving Bajesh and Taysha alone. The two just sat and looked at the fire quietly for a while.

Bajesh was still feeling a bit cheated by his mother's long stay and particularly the closeness she had been able to achieve with Taysha. He guessed that's where his older brother got it from. Bajesh was more like his father. It was a thought that made him quite proud, regardless, but he wished he could just turn on the charm like his older brother and mother could.

"Aiya~!"

The sorrowful sound made him look up from poking at the fire to see Taysha sitting there calmly smiling.

"What?" he asked. "What's 'aiya'? What's wrong?"

"Aiya~!" she repeated and rolled her eyes and raised her hands in mock panic.

At first, the unexpected show of action confused Bajesh. If it hadn't been for the jerky movement from her sore and injured body, Bajesh would have thought she had been faking her sickness all this time.

As his mind tried to comprehend the sudden attempt to communicate, Taysha sat babbling incoherently.

Bajesh would have worried about this, had it not been for the look on her face. It was a rather comical expression and Bajesh soon recognized the impersonation.

"Ah..." Bajesh said as he let his head fall back, "That sounds like Mother. Yes? Mama? She is 'aiya~'?"

"Mama. Dzje." Taysha nodded with a kind smile.

They laughed softly together at Taysha's light-hearted jest. Bajesh felt relief that they shared the same opinion of his mother's busy-ness.

"A good meal?" he asked with the necessary actions.

"Meol?" She repeated the new word questioningly and then understood, "A! Oon? dzje? Oon. Nom nom. Tre bodre-bo," she answered with a series of nods, her voice still weak and raspy.

" _Yes. It was very good."_ she thought, as her eyes lingered on the boy. Somehow in his quiet company she saw him more as the young man that he really was. The thought crossed her mind that if it hadn't been for him, she would still be laying half-dead in the field just outside the edge of the trees. Now she sat fed, warmed and attended to.

"You cleaned your hair?" he motioned.

"Nay. Brrrrr..." she responded incorrectly, thinking he was asking if she wanted to wash it in water.

"Ah. Yeah," Bajesh nodded, not stopping to think about the negative response. "I can do it for you next time if you like," he said, half embarrassed by his own boldness.

Taysha didn't understand and sat looking confused. Bajesh hesitated a moment, tempted to pass over it, but he found himself standing up and moving over beside her.

He picked up the hair ointment.

"See? Hair. Me. Can I see? See hair?"

She understood and leaned her head towards for him to touch. She felt vulnerable as she sat facing him cross- legged with the cool air flowing between her thighs.

She felt her heart race, happy that her thoughts could not be heard. She reproached herself and put the inappropriate feelings of him touching her out of her mind. She pushed the fabric of the tunic that stretched across her legs down with her hands.

But it was more than a simple rush of feelings at having her hair touched by an unknown boy. Bajesh was touching the braid that symbolised Taysha's belonging to another. The guilt of letting him do something that others might object to made it feel she was doing something wrong. She pulled her head back slowly and grabbed the braid as if to hide or protect it.

Having been asked by Mother about it earlier, Bajesh understood he had done the wrong thing by touching it. He sat back as an awkward silence surrounded them.

For Bajesh, he knew there was no real reason to inspect her hair anyway. Mother would have gotten out all the bugs and pieces of forest. Most of all, he felt there was no reason for him to touch the girl at all. He made a quick smile, and moved back over to his seat by the fire, mumbling "Good. Good," as adult-like as he could. He wished he could find an excuse to sit beside her longer, but besides checking her wrapped wrist and medicated arm, he could not. So, he sat on the log in front of her and played with the hair ointment container until Taysha said something.

The two seemed to find common ground in the difference of their language. That was; they both knew nothing of the other's tongue. For the remainder of the evening, they taught each other words from their languages.

By nightfall, Bajesh had gotten enough information to know her village had been attacked and everyone killed. That she lived beyond the eastern mountain and past the valley below. And she had been travelling anywhere between 7 to 13 days, but she couldn't be sure it wasn't more. When she had finished telling her story, they sat in silence, while Taysha sniffed and wiped her nose on the back of her hand.

Bajesh noticed that although her nose was running from her emotional tale, she did not cry. It was a little detail about this girl that added to his fascination of her. He wanted just to hold her, so she could let the sorrow out into his embrace like a girl should.

Taysha looked up at Bajesh with a half-smile and a shrug, as if to say, "What can be done?"

Bajesh returned the gesture with a wobble of his head. A motion that had Taysha start trying to communicate about their cultural differences.

It wasn't long after that they heard footsteps in the field and a man's voice calling Bajesh.

Bajesh stepped out into the clearing and returned with two men. They were both dressed in the rich colours of their tribe, and had dark brown skin with trimmed black beards. Their long black hair was tied tightly in a bun at the top of their heads. Both men greeted Taysha with a raised hand as they stepped into view. They seemed regal and wise. Both were soft spoken but they had a most definite strength about them.

They were introduced to Taysha.

One was Bajesh's father. She remembered the small spear was from him, and took the chance to use her newly learned "thank you" many times. The gentle man answered by wobbling his head, which Taysha was starting to think was quite an adorable habit of these people. He raised his hand and smiled as if it was nothing at all.

She was pleased to understand him say the word "wolf" as he pointed around them. She also recognized the accompanying sound that indicated multiple things. _Wolves_.

The second man was not so simple in introduction.

His name was Anami, but his relationship was a bit of a mystery to Taysha.

"A warrior, perhaps," she thought at first, but the way Bajesh and his father persistently tried to communicate, Taysha believed there was much more to him. Her obvious not understanding his position seemed to bother the men greatly. It had been repeatedly made clear he was not the chief as Taysha had suggested.

Finally the man stood and became animated in mock battle with unseen sword and shield, jumping about at his invisible enemies in a great show that thrilled Taysha to watch. He then pointed to Bajesh's father, and indicated he had taught him how to fight. He had also taught Bajesh, and even Mother. Apparently he, like his father before him, had taught the entire tribe.

There was no position in Taysha's village similar to the one this man held, thus there was no word for her to offer in exchange. She took their description in their language and played with the words a bit.

"A chief of weapons? A master of fighting. A teacher of the fighting, maybe... A _leader in the art of war_. A master of weapons..."

The three men sat curiously watching Taysha as she rattled on to herself.

"uk-opan pa-otak" she finalized confidently with a smile. 'A Master-of-Arms'.

She noticed that the man's eagerness for some sort of recognition had changed to a desire to learn the made-up title. Although the phrase sounded childish to her ears, she gave Anami the respect of her time for him to learn. But it quickly became apparent the words were not complimentary to their tongues. "Ookpan ... ukuma... ma'tak?"

Taysha waved her hands at him to get him to stop.

"Apa," she said the Amazoi word for 'Teacher'.

The word seemed to brighten Anami's eyes as he pointed to the man beside him, "Appa." he said.

Apparently, _appa_ meant _father_ in their language, and the connection seemed to please this teacher of war.

With introductions formally over, Bajesh started explaining to the two men all that Taysha had told him earlier, when Taysha suddenly started waving at him to stop.

"What is your tribe called?" she asked.

When her question was understood, Anami gave Bajesh a smack on his leg as punishment for having omitted such an important part of a first meeting. Bajesh's father gave a light-hearted grunt of disappointment.

Taysha couldn't help but smile at the men's teasing.

"Uh..." Bajesh started with a frown, "Wedic. We are..."

Bajesh suddenly pointed to everything around them, and motioned like he was putting it into his head. Taysha wasn't sure, but assumed the name of their people meant _knowledge_.

"Wedic." Taysha repeated, "I am Ama-zoi. _People..."_ she explained by pointing to all of them, "... of the Earth." she showed by taking a handful of dirt and holding it to her heart.

"Amazoi." the men acknowledged respectfully.

Bajesh proceeded to tell them of Taysha's journey.

As he spoke, Taysha was happy that she could tell which part of her story he was at by picking out the words she had just learned that day.

When Bajesh had finished, the men sat in silent reflection, while periodically offering Taysha looks of compassion and understanding of her hardships. She could no longer hold back the tears that streamed down her cheeks. Her tears were met by Anami stepping over to comfort her with pats on her knee, then returning to his seat at a respectful distance.

The two men asked and pondered questions, while re-confirming parts of the story with Bajesh. As they did, it became apparent to Taysha that it was these men who would eventually come to some decision as to what to do with her.

For the men, the unnerving part of Taysha's adventure seemed to be the presence of such a vicious tribe just over their mountain. There was a lot of 'hoorg, hoorg, hoorg' mixed in with their talk.

Taysha thought of asking them about the Great Water, but she felt like a child interrupting an adult conversation. After the long and tiresome evening, she felt it better left for another time when she had the strength for it.

When all seemed settled, the two turned and continued talking to Bajesh. This time, without translation or hand gestures, Taysha could only follow the odd embarrassed look from Bajesh. He patted the air with his hand, which seemed to tell her, "I'll explain this later."

Anami slapped his knee, showing all had been decided. The men stood and briefly startled Taysha by drawing their curved swords from behind their backs. The blade's length was roughly from the elbow to the fingertips with a fine taper and point. They used them to start chopping branches from the nearby trees. Taysha noticed that, though not heavy like an axe, the small swords were sharp enough to do the job without much effort.

A nervous-looking Bajesh moved over beside Taysha.

"They ... Father ... is thinking that ... uh, Father. Want. Me. Here. Sleep. Me sleep here. Understand?" he said, pointing to the area between the fire and the field.

For the first time, she could honestly say that she did. _"Father wants me to sleep here. Right,"_ she thought.

"Wolves..." Bajesh continued, "Uh. Father is worried. No, not worried." Bajesh stopped to recall the words they had taught each other, "Scared! You remember _scared?_ Yes? Good. Father is _scared_ of wolf. Wolves. Many wolf. All right?"

"All right," Taysha answered in his language.

Bajesh smiled and inhaled deeply. He stood and said something to the two busy men and then ran off into the field back towards his village.

Bajesh was overjoyed.

With a quick check over his shoulder to make sure he was out of sight, he began jumping and laughing quietly to himself. Oh, he would never get this smile off his face. He would be pestered by anyone who saw him once word got out, but it would be worth every moment.

It was a good thing Bajesh was a bit of a lone wolf himself. He got along with everyone well enough but he didn't belong to any one group. That would save him from having to stop and explain anything to anybody.

He crept around to the back of his hut, passing the river where two young lovers were sitting and talking. They asked him what he was doing, in an attempt to seem friendly.

"Nothing," he threw out with a quick wave of his hand. The couple turned their attention back to each other without much thought.

Coming around the front of the hut, the village circle was filled with people, talking and sharing stories at the end of the day. Others were bringing in firewood, sharing from the community tea pot, or playing games. Bajesh noticed what he felt were knowing looks from a group standing on the opposite side of the village, but he chose not to make eye contact with them and quickly dipped into his home.

No one was there. He then realized one of the people in the group who had been looking in his direction was his mother.

The problem Bajesh had was how to sneak out with his sleeping furs, spear, and bow and arrows. He could wait for everyone to go to sleep but that would be more conspicuous to anyone still awake.

Not to mention, he certainly couldn't wait that long.

He worked the problem over in his head as he organised all that he would need. When he finished, he still didn't know what he should do. He left his belongings close to the door and stepped outside to see the situation of the village.

"Augh..." he moaned, "There are far too many people in this village. Far too many."

He could never creep out unnoticed with a full pack on. He tried to catch the eye of his mother, who was still standing with a group of the village women talking about all the cares known to man. She looked straight at him once, and he raised his eyebrows in a quiet plea for help, but her gaze quickly turned to the conversation, followed by an outburst of laughter.

"Hopeless," he thought. Then he had an idea. He walked over to the group, ignoring the greetings as he headed straight to his mother.

"You know your pot from _Grandmother?"_

By the manner that Bajesh said 'grandmother', Mother knew right away he was talking about her mother who had been killed in the Last Ambush. The chatter quickly ended.

The pot was one of the few material things that meant a lot to her.

"I think I broke it," he said dryly.

"What? How? You think? What do you mean, you think?" she replied sternly.

Not wanting to send her into a panic that would draw all the women in like the geese at feeding time, he stuttered back, "The edge. I broke a piece off the edge. Not much, but..."

His mind started racing. He hadn't thought of details.

"It's just ... just come and see. It's not that bad. I just want you to see if we can fix it."

"Oh, for the love of the gods," Mother cursed, "If it's broken, I'll send your father after you."

She parted from her group of mothers in a way Bajesh thought she was just showing off her authority.

As soon as they stepped inside the hut, he confessed he lied so he could get her over to help him leave with all his stuff.

"Your father told you to stay with her?" she questioned in disbelief as she instinctively checked her mother's pot.

"Not _with_ her. I mean, they're making a hut for me now."

"They, who?"

"Anami and Father. He told me to come and get what I needed. Besides, he said that Taysha ... that she might be mentally broken. She should have someone nearby."

Mother greeted the explanation with a slight look of scepticism, but she said nothing.

"Just take it and go. If anyone asks, I'll tell them you're off hunting with your father."

"But Father will come back after I get there."

Mother let out a short, quick sigh and placed the pot back on the shelf.

"Then tell him that's what I'm telling people. He can creep back at night or tell people he just left you to the wolves."

Noting that her son didn't appreciate her humour, she repeated in a more kindly fashion, "Just tell your father, all right? It'll be fine. We'll make something up." She smiled at him realizing her irritation was mostly leftover from thinking her mother's pot had been broken.

Bajesh nodded and reached down to pick up his things. Mother left the hut and started walking back towards her friends. Over his shoulder, Bajesh heard her proclaim, "I've sent him to the wolves. That will teach him."

Her joke was met with a surge of laughter from the group as she joined them in the continuing gossip.

Bajesh's face scrunched up in frustration. Sometimes Mother was simply a pest to endure. And without even realizing it, he was already making comparisons to her and the quiet mannered Amazoi girl.

When Bajesh got back to Taysha's camp, Anami and Father were still working on his shelter.

He told Father the plan his mother had thought up.

Before Father could answer, Anami gave him a tap on the leg with the blade of his sword.

"If we leave now," he suggested, "we'll have enough time to run to the top of the eastern pass to take a look over the mountain."

"Where the girl came from?" Father asked in a most informal manner that questioned his friend's sanity.

Anami answered with a slight wobble of his head.

"We won't be back before late-morning, I'd suspect," Father answered, calculating the run.

The comment was met with a blank stare from Anami. "Before sunrise, I'd say. Perhaps sooner." he added mischievously.

Father raised his face to the sky. Feeling the goading of his old friend, he smiled. "It's a long run."

"For you, old man..." Anami started, but Father interrupted him before he could finish.

"All right. All right... But, if we meet any wolves; I rest, you fight."

Anami gave a short laugh in reply as they dropped what they were doing and fastened their clothing tight for the run up the mountain.

"All right, son. She's in your capable hands now," Father said as he put a hand on his shoulder. The two men looked at each other and inhaled deeply. Anami gave Bajesh a wink as the two ran off into the field and towards the east.

Finding himself alone with Taysha once more, he looked over awkwardly. She was sitting in her shelter with a hot drink in her hand and a big smile on her face. He couldn't stop smiling back, and between the two of them, little bursts of laughter broke out.

"Ko-sa?" she asked.

"Kosa?" he repeated not fully knowing what it meant. It didn't matter anyway. They were both tired of teaching, learning and translating to bother.

More importantly was that Taysha was obviously as happy to see him as he was to see her. Though she still looked very weak and her eyes heavy, her smile spoke to him kindly.

He then realized he had kept her up all day.

"Sleep?" he asked with the appropriate gesture.

"Hmm," she replied, with a nod of her head.

Taysha felt surprisingly tired for not having done anything all day. It must have been the warm food and the good company.

She crawled back to her bed and Bajesh came over to help her lay the thicker blanket evenly over her body. It caught the heat from her legs almost instantly and she curled up to keep it local until she fully warmed up.

Bajesh went over to his shelter which sat within whispering distance. In between finishing its construction, he tended the fire and cooked his food. He was sad to see Taysha fall sleep right away, but happy enough she slept with her face to the fire. He took the opportunity to really look at her. Yes. When the sores had healed she would probably be the most beautiful girl he had ever seen.

It was late in the night when he was finally overcome with sleepiness. He felt a strange confusion of feelings when he decided to close the blanket on the shelter of the gently sleeping girl, but he knew if he didn't, she would be open to anything that came sniffing by in the night.

He tried to lower it without waking her but she dreamily opened her eyes at him.

"I'm just closing this for tonight," he explained, hoping not to startle her.

Taysha nodded softly in understanding.

Before he closed the blanket completely, he heard her whisper to him in his language,

"Tank 'ou."

"Thank you," he whispered back, not really knowing why.

\- - - - -
The following few days consisted of Bajesh teaching Taysha his language in between her sleeping and taking short walks to regain her strength. She also learned a small bit of the Wedic's history. At least, she understood they had come far away from the southeast lands many generations ago.

Taysha was healing quickly. She used her spear as a support less and less, and eventually it became more of a toy than an aid. Her main focus now was to get better and continue on to the Great Water as soon as she was able.

She thought of all the things she now possessed and wondered if they had truly been gifts, or if they were loaned. The thought of just taking everything when she left had crossed her mind but she thought it a horrible thing to do. Besides, the Wedic could easily track her. She figured if a couple of the older men of this tribe could run up a mountain and back in a day, she wouldn't have a chance of getting away.

Bajesh's mother came by once for a visit and a meal, which to Taysha's delight was not as spicy as her first. A milky sauce had been added to make the whole thing creamy. It now made her mouth water just remembering it.

Bajesh's older brother came by once, too. Bajesh simply introduced him as _Brother_. He was tall, handsome, and likable enough, to be sure, but it was obvious his strong presence made Bajesh quiet. Having an older brother herself, Taysha fully understood her new friend's position, and she dutifully ignored Brother's attempts at humour.

" _You really are nice and funny,"_ she thought, _"but you're not worth breaking the bond I have with Bajesh."_

After seeing all his wiles had no effect on the barbarian girl, Brother stood and gave Bajesh a pat on the way out.

"Pretty girl. Very pretty." he offered kindly.

Bajesh's father had made trips to her camp every day. Taysha figured it was easier for him to slip out of sight without raising suspicion than it was for Bajesh's mother. He came to check on her health and give them updates on the gathering of the Council concerning Taysha living with the tribe. She hadn't found the heart to tell them she wasn't staying and at nights the guilt of her indulging their good hospitality seemed wrong both to them and her slain family.

But she felt it was not something she could communicate properly with their limited knowledge of each other's language.

Father explained that they were waiting for the right timing to present her to the entire tribe. This timing had become complicated by the sudden death of an elderly man in the village. The Wedic would now be in continual mourning for three more days and three nights. No one would hunt, or fell a tree, or slaughter an animal until the Passing Feast when the soul would make its journey onward.

This event forced Bajesh to return to the village. If it was known to the others he missed the period of mourning to be with Taysha, it would bring more problems to their situation.

So for the next three days Taysha was on her own once more. Knowing the Wedic couldn't leave their village during this time, she battled with the constant whispers to leave right away. But, in the end, the choice was obvious. She must stay. Winter had clearly started and she wasn't fully recovered. It would make everything meaningless if she just went off and starved or froze to death. After all, the Wedic meant her no harm. They had also mended her wounds, fed her, given her their precious cloths, and most unbelievably, a metal-tipped spear.

No. She would stay although now it was painfully quiet and lonely.

She spent the first day sitting and staring into the fire, fighting off memories of what had happened to her and the others. By the second day, she found herself hoping Bajesh would sneak away to see her.

She knew he liked her. He would always turn shy and pretend not to look down her tunic when she bent over. He was gentle and kind, intelligent and funny. For a brief moment, she even wondered if he would come with her to the Great Water.

Her heart started beating heavily at the thought of gaining a travelling companion.

That was when she heard the wolf howl.

\- - - - -
The three days had literally been a nail-biting worry for Bajesh. He heard wolves crying low in the valley on his second night back and was tempted to return to Taysha. In fact, he would have, had Father not reminded him of the consequences of putting a barbarian ahead of tribal custom.

On the first day, Bajesh had been called into a quiet meeting of his father and Anami's allies to answer the questions of the others. He sat sweating, feeling as though he was five years old, as the men seemed to tower to the roof. He thought it all too serious for his liking. At least it was certainly more serious than it need be.

He wondered if he should just run away with her.

Apart from the frustrations of the secrecy, for the rest of the day, Bajesh came to understand the excitement of being involved in the politics of the village. During the mourning period, his eyes would meet the gaze of one of the men he knew to support him. They would instinctively nod to each other like a sort of secret brotherhood.

" _All rather silly,"_ he thought, _"We're just making an open show that we have a secret."_

The mourning custom required him to be out with the others through the day. He would sit quietly with his friends, though he found their chatter trivial compared to what was to come. Eventually, Mother or Father would drag him around for the mandatory parts of consoling the relatives of the newly departed. The prayers, held daily by the spiritual leader, were followed a light soup served with a tea, while the evening meals included a small bread for substance.

The Wedic did this to suffer with the bereaved family. And, although distracted by the thoughts of the barbarian girl, a tear for the departed did fall from Bajesh's eye as well.

The deceased was a kind, toothless old man, who had sat mostly with his cane outside his hut, watching the goings on of the village as he drank his tea. It was said that he was a great hero in the Last Ambush. He was already considered an elder even then, but he still carried children to safety over the river, and he was one of the last people standing their ground to stop any attackers from following.

It was this man who had carried Bajesh's older brother across the river on his back. It was this man who had stood unfaltering between the attackers and the mother and children. It was this man who Bajesh spent days of his youth talking to about many things.

Despite his worry about Taysha, Bajesh was glad his parents had made him return. He would have regretted not having helped to celebrate this great soul's entry into paradise.

On the final day was the Departing Feast.

The women drank and the men drank more. They sang songs of heroes and gods, of love and of life as they raised cup after cup of fermented berry juice. Laughter took the place of the three days of tears as each person shared their memories and their love for one another and the dearly loved old man.

Bajesh was forced to endure the drunken affections of his mother, father and brother. He ended up sitting next to his grandmother who, though drunk and smiling with her rosy cheeks, did not smother him with undue affection. A simple pat on his knee and her smile was all they needed between each other. At the end, Bajesh lay in his bed awaiting the rising sun of the fourth day, and the official end of mourning.

He would have left that night if he could. It seemed like lifetimes to wait. Grandmother's snoring, the muffled sounds of his parents love-making, and his overly full stomach didn't help either. His brother was off somewhere. Bajesh knew it was somewhere with his woman and they most certainly wouldn't be back at her family's hut. He wondered where the two went to during the cold nights.

" _Brother must have a spot for the two of them, like me and Taysha,"_ he thought.

Bajesh smiled at the words, "Me and Taysha."

He repeated it before being rudely distracted by more noises from his parent's bed.

"Oh gods, protect me," he moaned loudly, before rolling over and burying his head in his furs.

He woke to Grandmother's snoring and he turned over on his back. He lay there a moment with his eyes closed, listening.

All other sounds both in and out of the hut had ceased. He slowly opened his eyes.

The glow of the fire had died. That meant it was far into the night, if not early morning. He heard a few murmurs from someone talking somewhere near the main fire, so there was someone out there still. Bajesh knew if he allowed himself, he would slip back into sleep.

He forced himself to get up and crept out of the hut with his spear. Before he could get round the hut and into the darkness, he heard his name being forcefully whispered behind him.

He turned to see it was one of the men from the secret meeting. He was running on tiptoes towards Bajesh from a group of men sitting around the fire. He drunkenly looked around him to see if anyone was watching.

"Bazjesh," he slurred, "BazjeSh. You. You are a great man." His ripe breath was a finger's length from Bajesh's nose.

"You're... yorgonna be a village lead'r. Yup. You havema alligence ... great man. You have ... did a great thing. Poor girl..."

Bajesh could only nod as the man gave him a painful slap on the shoulders. He watched as his drunken supporter wobbled backwards towards his friends at the fire, turning once and putting his finger to his lips in a signal of secrecy. Bajesh waved in thanks and understanding, and beat a hasty retreat towards the dark forest. He was glad that sort of drunkenness wasn't a nightly occurrence in his village.

When he arrived at the field he started calling Taysha's name. He stopped at the forest entrance so as not to frighten her. Her fire had died out. At least, he hoped that's all it was. His heart started beating at the thought she had left, or had gotten sicker, or worse.

He hurried as he continued whispering her name and entered her camp area. When he saw the coals glowing below the rim of the surrounding rocks, he let out a sigh of relief. Better yet, was the motion coming from Taysha's shelter as she pushed the fabric door out of the way to reveal a very sleepy, yet happy face in the moonlight.

He went over to her and leaned close as he whispered, "I'm so sorry. It must have been a long wait. I'm so sorry."

Without thinking of protocol or proper manners, he let his hand brush the hair from her cheek. The blemishes on her face had cleared well, showing her more beautiful than he remembered. Taysha, looking relieved that he had come back, smiled at him. Then to Bajesh's surprise, she raised the fabric as high as she could to invite him in. The thought of his mother or father coming to find them together made him hesitate, but he figured they wouldn't be up until mid-day anyway.

"Wait. Wait," he motioned as he jumped over to his shelter, opened the flap, and pulled out his sleeping furs and cloth. He pulled them back to Taysha's shelter.

Although he ended up half on her bed and half outside the bottom of her door, he might as well have been sleeping on the clouds. He thought it must all be a dream, especially when Taysha pulled her head towards his chest as she curled up beside him.

He wrapped one arm around her, as it seemed she had fallen asleep instantly. He noted that her hair smelled like his mother. It was a rather awkward thought that made him smile in spite of the fact.

He did not get much sleep that night. The most frustrating thing was becoming hard despite his best efforts not to. Bajesh tried to control his breathing and his thoughts, but his body seemed to reach out towards the girl. Eventually he started hoping she would wake and touch him. He was even tempted to wake her with a cough or by bumping into her, but he didn't. Reminding himself he wasn't like his brother, he quietly got up and went to his own shelter to regain his peace of mind. After all, he couldn't very well walk around like that when Taysha woke.

He leaned to the edge of his shelter and pulled out his cock. He pulled and massaged it, like his brother showed him the year before, until the tingling sensation came to him and the white essence shot from its tip and onto the ground. His body satisfied, he lay panting, trying to conceal the heaviness of his breath. And all he could now think about now, was how Taysha would completely despise him if she knew of his unsavoury behaviour.

\- - - - -
The first thing Bajesh was aware of that morning was the smell of Taysha's hair lingering in his throat. He opened his eyes to see her standing by a freshly lit fire completely naked as she wiped herself with the bathing cloth. His eyes were half way up her legs by the time he realized she was looking at him.

"Ulan-no," she said with a smile. Her voice sounded like it was from a different woman all together. Bajesh was first embarrassed at having been caught looking at her and then surprised to see her not scramble for her clothes as she continued her wash.

In his village, it was common to see family members naked for brief moments when they changed clothes or bathed in their huts. Still, even then there was a display of modesty. Apart from that, they all swam or bathed in their bathing wraps during the summer. He had always found the way the wet fabric clung to the women's breasts exciting enough but this was another thing all together. He wondered if she was doing it that way because it was her culture or just because she was alone.

" _Who knows?"_ he thought, "Who cares, really?"

He tried to hide his smile as he felt an appreciation to the gods. Only they could make something like this happen. He bundled his sleeping-cloth onto his lap to hide his erection as he sat up.

"Good morning."

"Yes," Taysha answered back, "Goo'morning is Ulan-no ... Osfer. Osfer are my lang'age."

"Your ... your language?"

"Yes. Os-fer."

"Your language is called Osfer?"

"Yes." She answered proudly with a smile and bent over to put her washing cloth on a log. Bajesh instinctively looked away.

"I see."

"You want wint tea?"

"Wint? You mean, mint? Mint tea?"

"Ah yes," Taysha laughed. It was a full, healthy laugh not hindered by a sore throat. "Mint ... what is _wint_?"

"Wint? Uh, nothing. No meaning."

"Oh." She pouted as she started to apply the ointment on her arm and the healing sores and cuts.

"How's your wrist?" he asked, still unable to look at her completely.

Taysha looked at him with open mouth and pointed to him with a gob of ointment on the tip of her finger. "Wrist!" she said triumphantly. "I understand ... hahah. I say wint. But I think mint ... wrist. I... Uh, bit-no. Day bit-no..." she said shaking her head around with wide eyes as though she was an imbecile.

"Bit-no? An idiot? Stupid?" he asked, assuming her meaning.

Taysha fluttered her fingers around her head and rolled her eyes. "Idi'at? Idiat? Yes? Me ... bit-no."

He glanced up at her, but his eyes stopped at her naked breasts before looking back up to the gods.

"You tease me," he whispered at the sky.

As if in reply, Taysha turned her back towards Bajesh and held the ointment out to him. "On my bak. Pleez."

Bajesh breathed in deeply and checked the bulge in his pants. He stood quickly and skipped over before she could turn around and see him.

"Hurry. Cold," she said as she hopped from one foot to the other. Bajesh fumbled between getting too much or too little of the medicine on his finger. He nervously looked around him while he quickly applied it to her back and bottom. Surely his mother -– or worse, his brother – would appear at that moment.

Fortunately, Taysha had had enough of the cold and when she felt it was done well enough, she thanked him and quickly put on her pants and tunic.

Bajesh returned to sitting with his knees up to his chest.

When she had dressed she let out a big breath indicating the chore was complete.

"Come. I show you. I show you," she said.

"Show me what?"

"I do this. Come."

Bajesh grabbed his winter fur, and draped it over his arm to hold in front of himself as he walked. He grabbed his spear on reflex and let Taysha lead him towards the river. There at the edge was a big mound of dirt next to a freshly dug hole. Bajesh stood there looking very confused. Taysha wanted to explain, but there were no words in her limited vocabulary to do so.

"Mater. Amazoi na mater. Leed." Her face scrunched up as she realized words alone would not make it clear. Instead, she went about showing how the water would be let in, where the fire would be, the pile of rocks she would heat the water with, and then she showed him the blisters on her hands for her efforts with a shrug and a crooked smile. Bajesh stood shaking his head in wonder. Soon a smile crossed his face.

"A bathing hole? You're making a bathing hole, are you?"

Taysha shrugged. Apparently he understood.

Bajesh nodded. "You want me to help? I'll help. Sure."

Taysha literally jumped for joy. Bajesh looked at her happily as she clasped her hands and looked around in thought. For the remainder of the day she led Bajesh in the project. Unhindered by any hung-over visitors, they were able to finish it off late that night. They then took the blocking stone out to let the river water in and left it to clear overnight.

Once again they shared Taysha's shelter, but this time Bajesh remained more inside than out. There was an uncomfortable moment when they lay looking at each other face to face before Taysha suddenly turned around and curled up with her back into him. He could feel her on his crotch and was sure she could feel him back. Certainly, she could feel the pounding of his heart. He tried desperately to control his breathing until, to his shock, it seemed she had actually fallen asleep. The toils of the day gracefully led him to the land of slumber, saving him from a night of frustration.

The next morning he dragged his sore body out and to his hut for another quick physical release, but he was interrupted by the sounds of Taysha getting up too. He hid himself under his blanket, waiting for her to knock on the fabric. When it sounded like she had gone off for a morning pee, he quickly finished his business, covered it with dirt, and got up to start the day.

The two met at the fire for tea. Taysha had no patience for making breakfast. She just wanted to see their bath. So they headed straight over. The water had washed a lot of the dirt away but Taysha knew even with the layer of rocks around the edges it would be murky for days. She put the blocking stone back in place and stood watching to see if the water would leak out too quickly. It didn't, and a smile swept across her tired face.

"Mater vas," she said, taking the flint set out from her sash and kneeling by the firewood they had set up the day before.

"Mader-what?" Bajesh repeated with a yawn.

"Mater vas. Basing-hol-tiam. Bas ... basing. hol. taim"

"Bathing hole time?" Bajesh replied with a yawn, "Uh ... yeah. All right. I'm, uh, I'm going to make some breakfast then."

"Hmmm?" Taysha responded, not understanding.

"Meal." Bajesh reverted to her known vocabulary and expanded on it. "Morning meal. This is Breakfast."

"All right! Yes." she answered happily.

Bajesh went back to rekindle the main fire and cook up the eggs and boar meat. When he was done, Taysha still hadn't come to him, so he grabbed a gourd of tea and brought breakfast to her. She was standing there, leaning on her spear and watching the fire heat the rocks.

"Breakfast?" Bajesh asked holding out the bowls.

"Morning meal." Taysha repeated eagerly. "Bakefast."

"Close enough."

When they had finished eating, Taysha gave Bajesh a makeshift tool made from two freshly cut branches that had been fastened together at one end around a small stone. She held another of the same design and showed how they were used to pick up the hot rocks like a pinch, and drop them into the ring of stones in the middle of the pool. Taysha hurriedly dropped her first one in with a hiss and spittle of water and watched as it landed outside the stone ring.

"Kuvat!" she swore and went back for another rock.

"Kuvat?" Bajesh asked.

Without much thought Taysha pointed between her legs. "Kuvat."

"Oh," Bajesh replied quickly. His face flushed as he promptly lowered his rock into the pool. The Wedic men would use the word _cock_ as a curse word or jest, but the Wedic women would never use ... that word.

The two went back and forth, laughing and having a grand old time as they sent up spitting water and steam into the air.

Taysha eventually tested the water with her hand, stood up and started taking off her clothes. Bajesh didn't know what to do, so he pretended to tend the fire around the rocks that were left.

"Tay!" Taysha said, "Come."

Bajesh nervously dropped his sticks and let his sheep fur mantle drop to the ground.

"Oh!" Taysha said suddenly, "Cloth," she added with gestures for drying herself off. Bajesh was happy to postpone the inevitable a little longer and motioned that he would get them.

By the time he had come back Taysha sat splashing lightly in the water with her back to him. To his dismay she turned to face him and absentmindedly waited for him to undress.

Bajesh had a sudden change of mind.

"Ah... I don't know, what if Mother comes."

"Ko-sa?" Taysha asked.

Perhaps feeling his first excuse a bit childish, he decided to wrap his arms around himself to make a show of how cold it was.

"Dzje." Taysha answered with a nod. "Yes. Is cold. Quick. Quick. Here. Niiiice." she added with pats on the warm water as she sunk in up past her shoulders.

Seeing that he probably couldn't refuse Taysha's invitation without insulting the girl, Bajesh conceded. He gave Taysha a nod, but also motioned for her to turn around so he could undress modestly. Taysha puffed out her cheeks at the strange request, but did as he asked and sat lightly slapping the top of the water while she waited.

When Taysha heard the sound of him approaching, she turned slightly to look at him. After all, regardless of age or gender, people like to look. She was disappointed to see him clutching his member with both hands.

For Bajesh, the heat of the water --which would have normally sent him scrambling out of the pool-- was neutralised by his embarrassment at Taysha seeing him naked. He jumped in and quickly sat with eyes wide, breathing heavily. The water was not overly hot by Taysha's standards, but the contrast with the cold of winter made it seem almost unbearable to the young Wedic man. But that was nothing compared to his situation.

In the circular pool, he and Taysha had to sit facing each other or it would be strange. But he could see her naked form clearly and it was having the most undesired affects on his body.
Having had enough of this apparent Amazoi custom, Bajesh waved his hands at her in surrender and jumped back out, quickly grabbing one of the cloths to cover himself with.

"Sorry, Taysha. It's ... I don't know. It feels weird, you know, during the winter. I ... uh. I'll be back at camp. Sorry..."

He bundled up his clothes and headed back in his bare feet. Taysha thought the whole thing rather strange but sat silently and watched his ass as he scampered off.

Sitting back down, she didn't know what to make of the whole scene. She took the small clump of grass she had tied into a bundle to wash herself with. The washing soon turned to caresses and her hand found itself lingering between her legs. She gave herself a quick rub as the feelings of pleasure danced up and down her. Thoughts of her Betrothed, her first and only male sexual partner, flashed through her mind and she stopped. Her breathing slowed as she felt an indescribable emptiness of mind and spirit. Feeling as if her soul was being carried away, she inhaled deeply.

"Gotta move," she gasped towards the sky, "Besides, it's no fun without a bathing partner."

The cold wrapped around her like a blanket as she stood, but it bothered her little. She reached over for her cloth and wrapped it around her shoulders as she stood awhile in deep thought. She took another big breath to calm the surge of feelings, but her mind took her through the events of the last month for the uncountable time. She looked over her body. The ointment and medicines of the Wedic were incredible. Her wrist, although sore, was usable enough to dig a bathing pool. The infection on her arm was still red-ish, yet the wound had closed. She had a proper place to go to the bathroom just down river from the bathing area. She had food, water, shelter and, if desired, a man.

The latter thought collided with memories of her Betrothed, and set off the never-ending cycle of despair once again. An onrush of pain and despair flooded her mind and soul until her throat tightened. Her thoughts led her to the Hoorg boy who had tried to kill her and his arrow that almost did. The emptiness and meaninglessness of his action froze her mind as she stood shivering, chewing on the edge of her towel.

Back at camp, Bajesh threw another chunk of wood on the camp fire and looked back in the direction of Taysha's pool. He wondered what insanity had possessed him to leave. Taysha was obviously fine with the whole thing, but she was also so obviously innocent regarding matters of male anatomy.

He decided it would be alright for him to at least sit and talk to her as she finishes her bath. With his heart beating heavily, Bajesh started back towards the river.

When he stepped into view of the river, he spotted her just standing there in the pool, looking at the fire. He hid himself behind a tree to see what she was doing. The sight of her staring into nothing made him uneasy. For a moment, he wondered if she was praying, but her unblinking eyes told him otherwise. Finally she stepped up out of the pool and threw extra wood on the fire.

She stood up and held out her cloth like bird's wings to allow the heat to reach her.

Bajesh's eyes moved up and down, catching glimpses of her body as she changed positions. He turned and rested his head against the tree as his heart pounded heavily in his chest.

The feeling was more than mere desire.

Bajesh knew he was terribly in love with her and his unspoken fear of her leaving was starting to work its way to the front of his mind.

\- - - - -
It was strange for them both as they ate their midday meal in silence.

Bajesh was embarrassed about his sexual appetite for Taysha and struggled to separate that from his deeper feelings towards her. He imagined how shocked she would be to find his mind full of such unwholesome thoughts about her.

His desire to appear decent conflicted with the awareness of how improper it was for her to ask him to bathe with her. It was either something in her culture that he didn't understand or was it an open invitation to bed her. She _had_ seemed eager to watch him undress. The strange thing was that there was no coyness about her. That was a recognisable habit of a Wedic girl for showing interest in a man. This barbarian girl on the other hand; he couldn't understand.

Bajesh's silence during his inner struggle led Taysha to believe she had upset him over the bathing. She certainly didn't want to force her customs on her only friend.

Her mind worked hard to find a topic of conversation to bring them out of their awkward situation. She eventually decided it the perfect opportunity to ask about the Great Water.

The serious way in which she talked caught Bajesh's attention and the challenge of translating this thing of importance soon brought both of them back to where they had been a day earlier.

Patiently and methodically, they successfully communicated a large place of water. They believed they shared the common idea of a place like a lake but much, much, much larger. Bajesh said he had never seen anything like that, but his language had a word for water that tasted salty and brought people from one world to another on great boats. Taysha didn't have any knowledge of a funny tasting lake, but she was happy to hear Bajesh would ask his father about it later.

Bajesh had just collected the bowls to wash, when a wolf howl made them both jump.

The cry was clear, sharp and most disturbingly, it was close. It had come from across the small field directly opposite their camp.
The two were on their feet in an instant, holding their spears in the direction of the sound.

When he didn't immediately see any sign of the animal, Bajesh ducked back into his shelter where he kept his bow along with ten stone-tipped arrows.

"Keep looking around," he whispered to Taysha with gestures. She nodded in agreement and kept her eyes on the field as Bajesh strung his bow and set an arrow in place. Holding it loose with one hand, he propped his spear on the edge of his shelter and planted the other nine arrows in the ground in front of him. Taysha noticed what he had done.

" _Good idea,"_ she thought as she looked at the forest around her. Taysha wondered if it was "her" wolf. Maybe he had found her trail and followed her here. It seemed hardly likely after such a long time, although the fact she had just been thinking of it a while back made it seem plausible enough. She hoped it was, and that they could be friends. Just like the tamed dogs of her village.

A rustle from the forest ahead of them drew Bajesh's bow to point in the direction of the noise.

The next sound to be heard was much closer, and sudden. Along with the audible crack of branches came the sounds of heavy feet pounding the earth. It was loud enough to make Taysha think it was a group of men. Memories of the Hoorg attack flashed through her mind.

''No! Not again. Please," she begged.

She envisioned the ultimate in the macabre humour of the gods; to take her this far and to have her meet a wonderful man, just to have them both killed. Her swooning vision snapped into clarity the instant she saw the biggest, most fearful thing up to that time in her life. A grey and black blur of fur and legs leapt right past her and on top of Bajesh. It came out of nowhere and it seemed as large as a man. Bajesh brought his arm up to protect his face against the predator as it threw him backwards onto his shelter.

The wolf, originally aiming for the neck, was obviously not used to this type of animal that could bring its front legs high enough to block an attack. In a split-second choice to go for the available appendage, it clamped down on Bajesh's forearm.

It clawed and pushed with its hind legs as Bajesh screamed and tried to pull it off by the fur around its neck.

The wolf didn't let go. It was biding its time for the others of its pack to come to its aid. But they were not as quick as the Amazoi girl.

Screaming at the top of her lungs, Taysha pushed the iron tip of her spear deep into the hindquarters of the wolf. She did not pull out to thrust again but instinctively pushed forward in an attempt to push the wolf away. It would have worked well enough if there had only been one enemy, but from the corner of her eye she saw another grey body. Before she could turn to face the new threat, the wolf she had on the end of her only weapon grabbed hold of the spear with its teeth.

Taysha reacted by holding the spear more tightly, frozen with fear as she saw the second wolf two bounds away from her. It looked as though that wolf was leaping towards her as slowly as a cloud travels the skies. All the while, Taysha, Bajesh and the speared wolf were locked together. Bajesh tried to get out from under the spear stuck between Taysha and the thrashing animal. Taysha, trying to bring the spear round to the next wolf, was not letting go and fighting sideways against the beast until the pain from her wrist was shooting up her arm into her neck.

The second wolf unexpectedly stopped in mid-leap and slid towards them, gingerly jumping out of the way at the last moment. To their right, another wolf ran cautiously into view.

It stood looking through the bush at their injured leader. The Speared One finally pulled itself free, taking half of Bajesh's shelter with it. The other two growled and yelped in confusion, undecided on how to carry on the fight. The decision of their leader to flee quickly resolved the problem of indecision, and they retreated across the field towards the mountain.

Taysha's first instinct was to yell after them to frighten them off, but she wisely surveyed her surroundings for more attackers. Eventually the shaking of her legs took over and she sank to the ground beside Bajesh. He was on his knees, with his head on the ground as he tightly grabbed the mangled wound.

"Oh. This is bad. This is bad," he hissed between his teeth. Taysha could see the bone through the top of his arm and her head started to spin.

"We ... wegotto ... village. Mother. Father," Bajesh started, looking very pale. The thought that he might pass out helped clear Taysha's mind.

"Yes. We go," answered Taysha in his own language and started to help him up.

"Bring the spears," he forced out through his pain.

Taysha picked up their weapons when she noticed the blood dripping from the wound.

"Hurry," Bajesh grunted.

"No understand _huri_ ," she answered.

"Go. Fast. Quick!"

"Yes. I understand."

She quickened their pace as she held him around his waist. His head arched toward the sky and down to his chest as spasms of pain flowed through him. Taysha kept looking around them.

"Quickly, quickly," he repeated weakly.

"Yes. Yes. Kikly. We go kikly."

He snorted out little laughs through his nose in short breaths. Taysha looked to see if he was all right, only to find he was laughing.

"No..." Bajesh moaned, "Not _kikly_. Quickly. Qui. Kly."

"No," she replied mockingly, "Kikly. Kik. Ley."

They almost fell from laughter in their adrenaline high as they wove through the underbrush like two drunks.

All the while Taysha pleaded with Bajesh in her head, _"Please don't die. Please don't die."_

Taysha couldn't remember how far it was to the village, and was horrified to find there no sight of it. At times it seemed as though Bajesh had passed out on his feet, as his chin bounced off his chest as he stumbled along. A fresh jolt of pain would snap his head upright and give him the chance to adjust the direction home. Taysha felt him use her more and more as a crutch at every step.

At last she could make out the walls of the huts. She wondered how she could now get so close without smelling the smoke compared to her first day when she could smell it from the other end of the valley. Bajesh became more alert and hurried his fumbling steps, leading Taysha near where she had approached the village all those days ago. She could already picture the same old woman getting another shock.
Bajesh cried out for help as they came into view and instantly there was a commotion all around them. Taysha followed his lead towards his hut though she could already feel the unfriendly tugs on her fur mantle. Half the gathered crowd was excitedly chattering over the injured Bajesh almost fainting on his feet, while the other half was busy making it quite clear Taysha was not welcome among them. She searched through the crowd for one of the four other recognisable faces, but they were not to be seen. Taysha stood alone as those who had taken Bajesh made him sit down while one man held his wounds with both hands while others fetched proper cloth to bind them. Now a more hostile crowd of women made a wall between the two of them. One man walked up behind her and snatched the bloodied weapons out of her hands. The unfolding scene was now scaring her more than the wolf attack.

Bajesh's babbling to leave her alone went unheeded as Taysha started her retreat for the second time. This time though, her steps were heavy as she stole glances back at Bajesh. At one point she could see his hand reaching out towards her. It felt as if he was grabbing her by the heart, but the energy of the angry mob kept her slowly moving backwards until a man's voice rang out high above the noise of the crowd.

It was so loud and strong it made most of the women in the crowd jump, as did it Taysha. She could see, as the crowd turned to face the voice, a very angry Father storming towards them with his friend, the Master-of-Arms close behind. He ran over to his son and talked intently to him while Anami stood beside him. Taysha stopped moving backwards and watched as Bajesh answered at length, obviously upset and pointing to various people in the crowd as he ranted in disgust with tears in his eyes. When his father looked over at Taysha, it made her feel like running away. When he started walking towards her, she felt he was going to blame her for what happened.

Yet after a couple of steps, he calmly stopped beside the man who had taken her short spear. Taking it from him slowly, yet firmly, he walked over to Taysha.

"Thank. You," he said, as he returned the spear to her.

The tears flooded from her eyes. Father laid his hand gently on her shoulder as he looked at the blood on her tunic.

"Are you hurt? Injured? You all right?"
Taysha swallowed and sniffed.

"I all right," she whimpered, her chin starting to shake.

"Go back to your shelter. I'll be there later. Wolves are gone now, yes?"

Taysha stood there trying desperately not to start sobbing in front of the staring people.

Father repeated softly, "You. Go. Fire. I. Go. Later."

She understood, but she didn't like the idea of having to go back alone. With the obvious authority this man had in his village, the anger of some of the people standing behind him became less threatening than another encounter with the wolves. Trembling, she turned and started to walk away as the chatter of the people started behind her.

" _You must be joking,"_ she thought, "It's like feeding me to the wolves."

She looked down at her arm and tunic that was drenched in blood. For the first time, she actually doubted Father's sincerity. It seemed ludicrous.

"How does he know the wolves won't come back?"

Looking back at the blood on her arm, she knew it was not something she would want to bring back to her camp.

She stopped to wipe what she could off with grass, and if honest, to lead any wolves towards the populated village and away from her. It was then that she heard someone approaching from the village. She grabbed her spear and remained crouching as a precaution.

Taysha was slightly surprised to see it was Anami. She was thankful he was carrying Bajesh's longer spear.

"Hello there. Remember me?" he said with a smile.

But his smile melted away at the sight of the teary-eyed, blood stained young woman. He crouched down beside her and rested his weapon on his shoulder.

"I will take you to your camp," he said kindly, "You. Me. Together. Walking. Do you understand?"

She nodded thankfully and wiped her runny nose.

Anami pointed back towards his village.

"Bah... fools!" he scoffed with a flick of his wrist.

Taysha didn't understand the word, but she most definitely understood the feeling of his gesture.

Anami walked with Taysha back to her camp. He did his best to lighten the situation for them both. Although she understood absolutely nothing, his upbeat way of speaking worked well in lieu of comprehension. The fear and feeling of helplessness slowly drained from her body. She in turn became despondent at the unbelievable way half the Wedic people had chosen to chase Taysha away rather than help Bajesh.

By the time they had reached the camp area, Anami had politely stopped trying to console her. She would need time to sort through it in her mind, and learn to walk along the new path that lay before her. It was a path not usually set before a woman.

The remnants of the _battlefield_ caught Anami's attention. He stood, silently learning what he could from the clues that lay scattered about.

Taysha saw him looking intently at the broken shelter and the blood. She was relieved to find Anami asked no questions. Taysha always enjoyed the company of people intelligent enough to decipher problems on their own accord. This man, it seemed to her, was an even blend of the characters of Bajesh's mother and father. No wonder he and Father were friends.

Taysha had half expected Bajesh's mother to come over and scream at her. She didn't know why exactly. She didn't know Mother very well, but it seemed as though it was something she would do. Something a mother would do: at first, she would be really nice and helpful, then she would suddenly just lose her mind over something like this.

Taysha would just have to endure the scolding. What else could she do?

During his visit, Anami had fetched water, made tea, gathered the arrows, unstrung the bow, and fixed Bajesh's shelter. It wasn't long after that Father arrived. He had brought his spear this time. He also carried with him a long piece of sturdy cloth. Taysha quickly guessed that its only purpose would be to tie something up. He sat across from her on the log by the fire and talked with Anami in low tones. When they had apparently finished talking, Father looked over at Taysha who looked back nervously.

He stood up with the piece of cloth in hand and walked over to her solemnly. Something in the seriousness of his face frightened Taysha when he knelt beside her and reached out to take hold of her arm.

"Nay!" she pleaded in her panic and pulled away, wanting desperately to run.

"Hey, hey ... it's all right," Father responded gently trying to calm her. She only caught one or two of his words. "I ... blah blah blah ... teach. You. Is not ... blah blah blah."

He wasn't aggressive or trying to grab at her as he spoke. She realized she couldn't have gotten away even if she tried. So she put out her arm and let Father take her gently by the wrist as he placed the fabric over her arm.

"Pishvolena?" Father continued, "No? Wolf? Yes. You understand wolf. Wolf ar britay. Chomp chomp arm. Blood. Cloth. Very tightly. You. Cry. Ow ow. No problem. Tightly. Blood stop. Do you understand?"

Taysha sat with a most perplexed look on her face and Father gave his head a wobble. He knew that he was just confusing her. He crouched beside her, took her arm, and started to wrap the cloth around her forearm, right where Bajesh had been bitten.

Taysha understood he was showing her how to properly bandage a wound.

She let a lungful of air out. It brought her back to the time her father had taken her out to show her how to make a shelter and fire and how to throw rocks and...

Her tears started rolling down her cheeks.

"All right..." Father said gently as he finished tying off the end of the cloth, "Don't cry, girl. No. Cry. Don't cry there. It's all right now. It's not your _gol'ran_. Right. There, there. It's all right," Father consoled the young girl as she sobbed and sobbed.

He stayed crouched beside her as long as she needed. When she seemed almost through her fit of sadness, Anami handed Father a bowl of hot tea for her. She lifted her head to take the bowl and noticed the blubber she had left on her tunic.

"I sorry," she said their language.

Both men laughed lightly.

Taysha used her wrapped arm to clean the mess.

Father pointed to the bandage, as she wiped her nose. "Tie it tight, yes? You understand?"

"Taight," she repeated the new word, "I understand."

"All right. Then no more crying. You are the victor! Wolf is the loser," Father said as he stood and pretended to be a triumphant hero and then imitated the scared animals whining and running away. He grabbed hold of her bicep and bellowed, "Wooo! Victor! Champion!"

Taysha snorted again in a laugh and smiled. A smile had returned to her eyes as well, at least for today.

"All right then," continued Father, as he reached into Bajesh's shelter and pulled out his son's bow. "You take this."

Taysha held it across her lap, not understanding what Father wanted. He eventually got the message across that he was wondering if she could use it.

"I? No." she answered in his language.

"I _cannot_." Father corrected her intended words.

"I cannot," she repeated properly with a shake of her head.

Father's head wobbled in reply and turned to Anami who sat looking stumped over some unknown dilemma. He looked rather disappointed in the barbarian tribe who didn't bother to teach their women to use a bow. Taysha's fingers fidgeted with the bow as she watched Father and Anami back and forth.

Eventually, Father turned back to Taysha.

"No problem. Later. This is later. Now, we go."

"Go? Where go?" she asked.

"We. Go. Kill. Wolf."

"I no un'erstand _keel_."

"Kill, kill," he repeated as he thrust his spear into an invisible enemy.

The understanding showed on Taysha's face and with it her alarm at what was being proposed. But before she could oppose the venture, Father made her understand the larger meaning behind it. Pointing to the blood around them he spoke quickly, "The wolf hasn't got far. Wolf. Close. So, you always..." he started to tremble like a very scared person, looking around him frantically. "You understand? No good!" he stated in the booming voice he had used to part the crowd back in the village. Taysha swallowed nervously and Father gently motioned for her to stand.

Taysha stood in a daze as the two men organised themselves for the hunt. It was both thrilling and confusing for her. Did the women of this tribe hunt with the men? Or was it something about her that made them believe she was experienced in that sort of work?

Anami took the bow, re-strung it, and looked through the shelter to find the quiver and fastened it to his belt. Father was already picking up the trail out in the field as Taysha stood between them unsure about the whole thing. Anami had put all but one of the arrows in his quiver as he walked past her.

"Let's go," he said matter-of-factly, swatting her ass with the arrow.

Father and Anami started stalking right away. Each man made his own assumption about the wolf trail. It was something that impressed Taysha right away. She took pride in the realisation that moment was an opportunity to gain something she might never get another chance to experience.

Taysha's first instinct was to follow the two seasoned men without thought. But she knew she would not be made fun of if she copied their actions. It was an awkward and unfamiliar moment for her. She was quite clearly being treated as an equal, yet she knew she was nothing of the sort and it made her extremely self-conscious. It made her both feel special yet nervous. She was afraid she would cross some unspoken manner, or break some rule unknown to the weaker-sex, and they would revert to treating her like a little girl again.

She held her short spear tightly and made sure it was obvious she was looking in all directions as they continued into the forest. They were heading south along the mountain she first came down. Taysha finally saw the south river that the Wedic used for the village. It was about the same distance as the other one near her camp, though larger and not hemmed in with trees. It was nicer than the creek that Bajesh had shown Taysha. But she knew the Wedic most likely shared the common understanding that it was improper to use the water source upstream from another village.

The trail kept going far longer than Taysha expected after having seen the amount of blood at the camp.

She figured the blood had clotted in the animal's fur, bleeding less and less as it continued. The question was now were the other two wolves staying with the injured one or had they abandoned it to its fate? It was possible the injured one had gone off to die alone. That would certainly complicate the hunt.

Near the end of the day, the sun broke through the clouds as if to give warning of its departure before it disappeared over the western mountains. The forest exploded into bright orange as they made their way upwards. As they climbed, the mountain changed from a slope to jagged rocky cliffs. It would be an ominous place at night but the golden light seemed to be reassuring. It was then Father stopped and pointed.

And then Taysha saw it too.

Up on a ledge one of the wolves was peering down at them. Aware of being seen, it ducked out of sight. The men looked back to Taysha and gave her firm nods of support before carrying on. They moved together in a tight group: Father with his long spear in front, Taysha nervously wringing her hands on her short spear behind, and Anami following them both with his arrow tight on the string.

Suddenly, a wolf leapt off the ledge above and landed in a coiled spring for its next jump at Father, but it never made it to its target. Anami's arrow hit it straight in the neck and its body collapsed in a quivering mass.

"Next one's yours," he said to Father, his voice as calm as if he had just shot a squirrel.

The second wolf stood high on the ledge growling, snarling and baring her teeth as the three invaders continued their ascent. Father held his spear straight in between the wolf and himself as he approached. When they got just below the beast, Taysha could feel the vibrations in the air from the wolf's growl. She tried to steady herself from stumbling while keeping the point of her weapon between herself and the terrifying animal.

As they climbed closer, the wolf did not move, but Father had slowly retracted his spear so that it was about as far out ahead of him as Taysha's. Then he struck. Taysha let out a gasp as his arm extended the strike into the side of the wolf's jaw, causing it to yelp and pull back out of sight.

"Damn! Damn!" Father cursed as he scrambled over the crest to finish the kill. He tossed the spear lightly up in the air to change his grip and disappeared out of sight.

All Taysha heard was another yelp and scuffling and the horrible gurgling sound of something breathing through its own blood.

"Damn!" she heard Father shout again as she bravely scrambled up onto the ledge to see. Father had removed his knife and plunged it deep into the animal's throat. She heard the course scratching of the knife cutting bone before the wolf's legs stopped moving.

"Up you go," Anami said from behind.

She was shaking as she climbed up to Father. He was obviously upset about the poor kill and prayed quietly to his gods. Or perhaps, he was praying to the wolf. She wasn't sure which. Maybe both. She heard Anami say something and she looked back at him as he motioned her towards the cave to her left. Taysha hadn't even noticed it. Father and Anami were saying something to each other as Taysha took a hesitant step towards the black hole in the mountainside.

She looked back at Father who was crouched beside his kill, wiping the blood off his knife on the fur. He was looking earnestly into the cave as he did so.

Taysha's head snapped back to the cave, following Father's line of sight as she took another cautious step. She stopped and froze, teetering on the tips of her toes. The big rock in the shadow of the cave was breathing. She now saw the face of the beast that had attacked her beloved friend.

The recognition was mutual, as the wolf let out a low growl. Knowing his end was near, he didn't even bother to raise his head. The growl seemed to say, "Go ahead and finish this. I don't care."

Its breathing was shallow and he lay in a pool of blood.

A firm command from Anami behind Taysha made her jump. She turned to see him using his bow, like a spear, to show her what he meant.

"Strike!" he repeated, and she adjusted her grip on the little spear and steadied herself. She faltered and looked back at Anami. He was standing with an arrow at the ready.

He had a clear view of the wolf's head, but he was not taking the shot. It was obvious to her the men were waiting for her to kill it.

"Don't look at _me_ , girl!" he scolded in a harsh whisper, "Look at the wolf!" He motioned by sticking his chin out towards the dying animal. All she understood was "wolf", but she could feel the impatience in his voice.

She turned to look back into the cave not knowing if she could do the deed. As her eyes fell on the blood around its mouth, the vivid picture of Bajesh struggling for his life in front of her replayed in her mind. She thought of how this unrelenting beast had come to kill and devour them both. The flash of connection between the animal's sacred violation of their right to live, mixed with her memories of the Hoorg Attack, forced anger to well up in her throat. She plunged her weapon into the wolf's shoulder.

Drained of its lifeblood, the wolf could only gasp hoarsely, and snap at the new influx of pain as the metal tip entered deep into its body.

"The neck. Into the neck." Anami's voice came from behind. Taysha turned to see him pointing to his neck with his thumb as he held the arrow tight on its string.

Taysha turned back, withdrew the weapon and once again pierced her enemy. It was a clean strike and well placed into the breathing canal. She could hear its final breaths enter and leave through the hole she had created, gurgling like a brook until the wolf drowned in its own blood.

The silence that then engulfed the world, she would never forget. The wind, the birds, the heavy breathing of the men behind her, all disappeared. For a brief moment, she feared she had died herself and turned to the men to make sure they could see her. They could indeed.

Father gave her a nod of approval as he approached her slain prey. He knelt down and reached into the small cavern to stroke the fur of the wolf. He began to mutter to the gods as he motioned for Taysha to touch the fur as well. He held her hand through one stroke of the fur in ceremony then let her hand go.

Anami disappeared out of sight below the ridge. Taysha guessed he was doing the same for the first wolf.

The prayer finished, Father grabbed the animal by the flesh and started to drag it out.

Suddenly, he jumped to his feet so quickly he hit his head on the cave roof and almost knocked Taysha down in his panic to get out. She half grabbed Father and the wall of the cliff as her spear tip fell dangerously close to her face. She steadied the weapon by the stock with her chin as she scrambled to regain her footing.

"Ohhhh..." Father said in a quiet voice as he dropped his spear and held the back of his head. With a couple firm rubs to dull the pain, he bent down and half crawled back into the cave. He reappeared with two struggling wolf cubs now whining and yelping. In a flash, Taysha envisioned herself as the Hoorg and the cubs as the sole survivors like herself. She felt she had done something unforgivable. Something terrible.

Her thoughts were broken as Father handed one of the cubs to her.

Taysha reached out towards the struggling little creature and grabbed it from behind the neck, as she knew to do. She instinctively held it close to her chest to stop it from trying to escape. It was big enough to give her trouble and she was happy it wasn't trying to bite her, but the little claws were scratching her through her tunic.

The two men tied the two pups together with the fabric Taysha still had tied around her arm. There the wolf cubs sat until the men decided what to do with them.

Taysha kept a close eye on the men as they talked. She had a funny feeling she knew what they were planning to do just by watching the movement of their eyes as they spoke. Sure enough Father stepped over to the cubs and lifted his spear.

"NAY!"

Taysha yelled a lot louder than she had intended to, but although embarrassed, she got the message across. Father and Anami silently looked at each other for a moment and Father pulled his spear back. Anami puffed out his cheeks as he let out a mouthful of air and looked over the three dead wolves.

Taysha stood awkwardly as the two men talked once again. To her relief, they ended up loading the two dead female wolves on Anami's shoulders. Father took Taysha's larger kill and they had her carry the weapons and bring the pups. The wolf cubs showed to be as much a burden for her as the adult wolves were for the men. They yelped and constantly tried to scramble out of Taysha's grip the whole way back.

It was fully dark before they had even walked out of sight of the cliffs. Taysha tried carrying then dragging the pups, then carrying them again. The men didn't look as though they would wait for her if she lagged behind and she wasn't about to spend the night alone with two animals that would eat her in her sleep.

With the time taken for a couple rests for the sake of their backs and a drink of water, the moon was creeping up past the mountain peaks. By the time they made it back to the Old Field in front of Taysha's home it was directly over their heads.

The men dumped their burdens in the field and stretched their backs. The steam rose from them in the moonlight, and their breath lingered thick in the air. Taysha found herself thinking they looked quite magnificent. She also regretted not having carried at least one of the adult wolves.

That, she promised herself, would not happen again.

\- - - - -
Father realized he had been staring at Taysha and turned to see Anami doing likewise. Taysha's attempt not to show she was tired gave her a rather regal look in the moonlight. The two men met each other's gaze and the gesture of raising their eyebrows at each other summarised any words they could have spoken. Yes. The barbarian girl was destined for something, that was certain.

"We might as well cook something up here," Father suggested, "Mealtime is long over anyway. All we'd get is a scolding in our bowls if we went back for food now."

"Sounds good to me," Anami replied, "I was thinking we should clear up the blood around Taysha's camp as much as possible, or move her."

"Yeah. I was thinking the same thing earlier. But to where? We can't bring her to the village yet."

"No. But it seems time to talk to the Council about her."

Father nodded silently in agreement as he stretched.

"Anyway," continued Anami, "you should go see your boy. Take a wolf to him. I'll get things organised here."

Without hesitating, Father leaned down and picked up one of the female wolves, threw it over his shoulder, and started walking towards the village.

"And bring back some more food. Spices. Or beer!" Anami called after. Father gave a quick wave in reply.

Anami walked over to Taysha.

"You did good," he said, "I think you might want a proper spear. Do you want a spear?"

"Spear?" Taysha confirmed, holding up hers to show.

"No. no..." Anami laughed, "That's no spear, girl. That's a javelin... For throwing. Throwing..."

She clearly looked confused at the motion of Anami throwing the spear.

"I see..." he said, "Well then. I will have to teach you."

When his offer was understood, the tired countenance of Taysha's face was replaced with one of excitement.

"Yes," thought Anami, "This girl is destined for something."

\- - - - -
The glow from the freshly kindled fire threw a dancing light on the trees around Taysha. She sat on her bed with the wolf pups tied to the far shelter post. They were so tired they hardly reacted to her now.

"Poor things." she whispered to them.

She ran her finger down the javelin that sat across her legs. There was something different about the weapon now that it had taken a life. She touched the tip thoughtfully as she understood why the boys acted differently after their first hunt. How bravely they stood between the horrors of this life and their women. As a girl, Taysha had thought the young men returned tired from the hunt... or arrogant. Now she knew there was far more to it than that. It was a drain on the soul to kill.

Her eyes went to the pups, who were sleeping as far from their captors as the cloth rope allowed them. Taysha's head hung heavy on her chest.

"Go to sleep," motioned Anami, "You did well today. Sleep now. You've earned your rest."

She understood enough to know to lay down.

Through her state of semi-sleep she was aware of Father returning but they didn't try to wake her, so she drifted back into her dreams as the men ate and talked quietly.

Father had brought back extra furs, food and drink and another spade to get rid of the bloodstained ground. They would stay together that night and then bring Taysha to the Council in the morning. And most importantly, bring her to the safety of the village. There was no fear of ants or flies at this time of the year, so they left the dead wolves where they lay. Besides, it wouldn't be long until the sun rose and woke them with it. They ate and drank warmed drink and left some beer and stew beside Taysha in case she woke.

They fed the pups scraps of boar bone and goose. It was good fortune that the pups were too small to be a threat, still they would not be small forever. The men decided to put the wolf-cub problem aside for the moment.

The first thing was to get the approval of the council members then they would worry about future wolves.

Taysha woke to Anami scooping up the bloodied ground next to her. He gave her a nod and a "Good morning" before taking the soiled earth to 'her' river.

Taysha saw the cold stew left out for her and she took a wooden spoon to taste it. Spicy. Very spicy.

She grabbed the drink and gulped it down until the taste of alcohol hit her throat and she coughed up half of it all over her. When she looked down to wipe it off, she noticed her tunic was still stained with Bajesh's blood.

She desperately wanted to see him.

Father was gone and Anami seemed fine, so she assumed Bajesh was doing all right. She tried to put it out of her mind for now. One of the men had moved the two pups to a stake on the other side of the fire during the night. They shifted nervously when they saw Taysha get up. She looked at them sleepily.

"Poor things," she said again, wondering what fate lay in store for them. She assumed the men would take them away from her. At least they had been kind enough to put out a bowl of water and bones for them.

"Not so bad then," she said to them cheerfully. "I bet your meal wasn't spicy."

Her half smile faded as the two little animals sat looking sorrowful and fearful. Taysha got up and walked over to see the dead wolves in the field. There was only one left – the big male one. It lay motionless as small waves of morning breeze teased its fur.

She recalled the hunt and the kills in her head and she crouched down and stroked its side. Her involuntary introduction to the circle of life overwhelmed her and she looked up into the sky to calm herself. Then she closed her eyes and breathed deep.

"Breath is Life. When you are lost, breathe and all will become calm once more," she repeated the words of her father.

It was strange, but true. She took a simple deep breath and her spirit calmed and focused on the present. She opened her eyes slowly and returned to the fire to warm herself.

\- - - - -
Father had returned to the village that morning to find his son struggling with the pain. He had a small fever and the sleeping cloths were being changed. The Wedic considered the fever good in this case. It was an indication that any infection he may have was being destroyed. He would have to fight through it though. Realistically, there was little else he could do.

Bajesh rolled and moaned deliriously throughout the day. It pained Father to see him like this. He felt his poor killing of the wolf may have been guided by the gods; a small vengeance for his son's tortures. Father's kills were usually clean and quick. It was not like him to make such a mess. Seeing his son writhe in pain, he did not feel so bad about it anymore.

He left the wolf at his door for his mother and wife to skin. The passing people of the tribe spat upon it ceremonially. Even the smaller ones came to spit on the beast.

This show of social unity helped ease Father's anger against them and he went to set a time to talk with Council.

The members voiced their concern for the health of his son and pledged their help to Bajesh and the family during the hard time. Their countenance changed quickly when Father told them he wanted to bring the barbarian girl in to live with them.

The time to talk was set for midday that day. Father walked away figuring they were simply wanting to get it over with but he left it to the gods for the time being. With one last look in on his son, he returned to his friend and the girl he had been entrusted with.

Back at the field, Father found the male wolf gone and the camp empty. He checked the two pups. They sat quietly, seemingly to have given up trying to chew their way out of the fabric ropes that bound them.

With the wolf missing, it didn't take Father long to figure out where Taysha and Anami were. Sure enough, they were at the river with the wolf strung up and skinned. Anami whispered to him that Taysha was planning to eat the wolf meat. The two men considered it her culture and not their business. So Father explained to her that he would bring a cured wood for smoking the meat later.

They then readied themselves to return to the village.

When the three of them appeared at the village, the men stood ceremoniously on each side of Taysha. She had been told to carry her javelin with pride and let no one take it from her.

This time no jeers or yells greeted her, only cold stares and surprisingly enough, some smiles. The village was obviously divided about her. She wondered why they didn't have a chief. It certainly made for easier decision making, right or wrong. She tried to look bold, but the crowd that had twice formed a wall in front of her was now encircling her, murmuring, whispering.

It was the odd sound of laughter that bothered her most. It was beyond her imagination what the few would think so amusing in all of this. She boldly looked around to find who it was and seeing a couple of young men smiling at her, she returned their gaze with a cold stare.

The village centre had a large fire surrounded on three sides by two tiers of split-logs for sitting on. Taysha felt it was larger than the one in her village but in her village they still had trees among the huts. The Wedic seemed to have cut all the trees out from the middle, leaving quite an impressive open space.

Taysha was led to sit on one of the lower logs. Various people, who were apparently supporting her, sat nearby. But the numbers were few compared to those who distanced themselves. Anami and Father sat on either side of Taysha and waited for everyone to settle. The apparent elders sat directly across the fire from Taysha and stared at her unapologetically.

She actually felt worse sitting there than killing the wolf the night before.

When all had settled, Father made the presentation of Taysha who was promptly excluded from the whole event.

A lot of it was due to the language differences. From Taysha's viewpoint, it was all beyond her comprehension. It was like an argument in which every single person of the village was involved. No one walked away and constant bickering erupted that forced the leaders to quell it again and again before they could proceed.

They still talked on as the sun began to set behind the tip of the western mountain and a group of young boys were charged with the task of lighting the fire.

Taysha sat with her head down as she quietly placed one foot over the other, then back again, keeping herself entertained. Her back and ass hurt from sitting so long. In his attempt to provide emphasis to his argument Father had at least been able to rise and sit down throughout the evening.

Taysha had grown bored and thought they all looked rather stupid.

She couldn't imagine something like this happening in her village, where they all minded their own business. For the Amazoi, it would have been an issue amongst the members of the one family who found her.

She sat up straight and stretched her back while doing her best to show anyone watching she was not impressed and just wanted to leave.

But no one seemed to notice or care.

Yeah. The Amazoi way was simple compared to this. Taysha noticed how the Wedic almost seemed to enjoy it all. She was pretty sure some of them were just throwing out retorts to everything Bajesh's father had presented as a matter of course. It seemed to her that they had been talking about the same things over and over. As the Amazoi would say, they were tying rope for the sake of tying knots.

Arguing for the sake of arguing.

Idiots.

At one point, the word "wolf" came up so many times she felt the conversation had turned from her to some sort of wolf problem she didn't know about.

Not all the counter-arguments were presented by the thrill seekers. There were clearly those who hated Taysha deeply. Of those who genuinely argued against her, most seemed convinced she had brought the wolves with her and caused division among their people. There were enough signs from the gods for either side of the battle, and the Council had eventually heard enough.

More honestly, they had become hungry and motioned they would take the information presented to them and make their decision later that evening. They ordered Taysha to go back alone to where she was staying and not return until the decision was made. With that, the meeting ended.

Taysha looked up at Father as he signalled to her to get up. She took notice of the group of important community elders rising from their seats across the fire from her.

"Thank you," she called out to them in their language. She made sure her voice was loud enough for all to hear. It stopped everyone short and created the desired affect.

Father's placed his hand on her shoulder with a smile of pride as if she had just given the best argument that day.

But Taysha hated herself the moment the words left her mouth. She hated her underlying plea for mercy from these babbling idiots. Her feelings intensified when she noticed the scornful looks from almost every Council member in reply. She could see one mutter something to himself as he turned his back. Their wits recaptured, her attempt at showing herself friendly was ignored.

Anami, Father and Taysha's supporters walked her to the edge of the village where they stopped and tried to explain the best they could to the confused girl.

The Council had clearly ordered for her to leave. It wasn't advisable to openly argue against the final decisions of the Council members. As they stood there explaining, one small girl from the village made her way through the group, reached up and gently pulled on the hem of Taysha's pants. Taysha looked at her and the girl simply smiled back with a mixture of greeting and interest. Her mother called her away and the girl let go of Taysha's pants and walked away with a graceful wave of good-bye. The strangeness of the event during all the talk seemed to clear Taysha's head.

She was thankful for those who fought for her but the reaction of the Council to her situation felt like a spit in the face. She was tired and hungry, and the start of friendly chattering and laughter coming from the main fire area made her feel all the more alone. It was as if the whole event had never taken place and she had now become invisible to them.

She didn't know which was worse, being yelled at and threatened with rocks, or being completely ignored.

"Probably the rocks," she thought as she realized that if nothing else, her present position was better than the day before.

Father had finished talking at some point and had disappeared. Taysha had to sort through the countless thoughts she had to remember where he went.

"Ah. Knives ... he said something about knives," she told herself as she exchanged tired smiles with her supporters.

She at least found out which of the huts was Bajesh's when his mother appeared at the door. It was the hut near where she had first come into the village on the left side. Taysha had noticed Mother hadn't even been at the meeting. She thought it was because Mother was mad at her, but it was obvious by her concerned smile towards her that it was because of Bajesh.

The thought of him lying in pain made Taysha's stomach ache with the desire to just walk over and enter the hut to see him. Mother seemed to read her mind as she gave Taysha a sad look of understanding. Taysha answered the look of sympathy with a half smile and Mother stepped aside and held open the wooden door for her. Taysha's mouth opened in surprise a brief moment. Her legs took to the hut before she could think of hesitating.

"Bajesh is sleeping," Mother whispered, "but he's all right. See?" she added with a smile. Taysha poked her head in to see him sound asleep just behind a low wooden divider.

"Thank you," Mother said as Taysha stepped back from the door. The kind words released a gasp of suppressed emotions and fears. She put her fingers to her mouth to stop from sobbing out loud. As Mother embraced Taysha and stood consoling her outside the hut, her position in the argument was made clear enough to the rest of the tribe.

Father emerged with a butchering knife and woodchips for curing the meat.

"What's that for?" his wife asked.

An awkward look crossed Father's face.

"She eats wolf meat."

Mother's mouth opened in an expected opposition to actually eating animals that eat other animals. But she closed her lips together softly without a sound.

It was not the time, nor place, for her to scold.

\- - - - -

The Wedic Council had reached a pivotal point in their evolution as leaders. It had always been obvious to them their influence over the village was grounded in the support of a few men. These few men were, annoyingly enough, not only the best-trained fighters of the tribe but the most charismatic. Though the Rule of Assembled Thought governed the Wedic, the underlying threat of violence was always present if Council went too far. The Council could no more openly challenge Anami and his group than the group could challenge them without a collapse of order. It was a delicate balance between the various parts of the tribe collective. This ability to maintain order among the different groups was the basis of their name, as the word "wedic" meant "to be united."

The Wedic were actually a collection of different families that had separated from the main group almost 20 years earlier. It was their common desire to live under the Law of Council and not by the rule of one chief that had united them in the past.

But if the Council showed they followed every request by Anami, it would soon lead to trouble. They would be accused of being Anami's pets and their real power would quickly dissipate. On the other hand, it would be most unwise to anger the military leader of their village.

Anami, by law, could take control in times of war. And theoretically, a conflict amongst themselves could be considered a war.

The case of the barbarian girl had brought a terrible conflict upon them. It was a clear division, steeped in the religious beliefs that the girl had either been sent by the gods for the Wedic to protect, or she was sent by the demons to divide and destroy them. In the survival attitude they had adopted since the Last Ambush, they quickly clarified the girl would not stay until they knew for sure. Word from the head priest was paramount, and to the Council's relief, he agreed.

"If she is from the gods, they will make it clear to all of us, not just a select few. Thinking otherwise is sacrilegious."

Knowing even Anami would not argue the respected priest's decision, they worked next on defining the laws of restriction that would establish the extent of their authority as far as the girl was concerned. They quickly decided that to kill her or chase her off would provoke the opposing men to arms.

The head priest mentioned that doing so would also provoke the wrath of the gods, had they indeed sent her to them.

Banishment and an order to leave the valley would enhance their authority but would also quickly deteriorate it if Father openly opposed them with Anami's support. Besides, it would make them look cruel.

The Council spent the rest of the night in deep whispering on new ideas of how to balance the natural authority of those men who supported Taysha without endangering their established authority in the process.

By morning, they agreed foremost that their right of law extended to where the village could be seen. This worked for their second decision that none could yet say with certainty if the girl had been sent by the gods, or by the demons. In their final decision, they declared that the barbarian girl could not come within view of the huts until they knew either way. In addition, she could not use the village river at any point, and a proper portion of all meat from her hunting kills would be given as compensation for her hunting in their valley.

In Wedic fashion, the laws were given at the fire where the tribe's adults had gathered.

Then came what was known as, "clarifying the laws." What is a "proper portion" of meat? What would Taysha do in the late summer when the smaller creek dried up? How was she supposed to get the meat to the village if she wasn't allowed to be within sight of it?

When all had been settled, the elder Councilman Dinesh cited the most important of Wedic laws, which stated they could not command any man who travelled outside of the view of the village.

But the mere mention of it, along with Councilman Dinesh's look of distain, clearly gave the message that anyone doing so would not be received warmly.

\- - - - -
Taysha had returned to her home alone, but was relieved to see Father appear shortly after.

Father explained that Anami was remaining behind to hear the Council's decision and would come later. He then started to dig out a small pit to use for smoking meat.

Taysha was happy to find Father treat her like her own child. Though she didn't understand the exact words, at least Father took time to explain what he was doing. All the while Taysha noticed how tired he looked. His son's injury, the hunt, the constant arguments at the Wedic village... Taysha both admired him and felt guilty for being the cause of his pains.

By nightfall, they had sliced the meat, arranged it into groups for smoking and moved the framed skin out into the field to catch any sun that may appear.

In the morning, Taysha woke to find Father sitting out in the field, stretching the skin with a blunt knife. She heated the stew and a bowl of hot tea to bring to him. He gratefully accepted them from her and she crouched beside him as he ate.

She helped tighten the lashings on the frame and Father taught her more words: fur, stew, bowl, rope, grass, the difference between branch and stick, and the name of the assortment of knives in his leather pouch.

After spending a day with the man, Taysha understood there was no sense in bringing up the topic of yesterday's meeting at the village. If there was anything to have been said, Father would have said it.

Instead, Taysha tried to ask why the Wedic had no dogs.

To her dismay, it ended up a more difficult subject to translate than she imagined.

"Wolf. No wolf. Small wolf. Woof-woof."

That was about as much as she could muster before they both gave up on communication for the day and had a quiet dinner by the fire.

\- - - - -

Father perked up at the sight of Anami approaching.

"Thought you'd never come," he remarked, cutting at a block of wolf meat and adding the thin strips to the basket.

"Brought my skinning tools. Thought it would help."

"All done. Half the battle was digging that damned pit." Anami crouched down and took a look at the large, smoking mound of earth that branched off from the main fire.

"Would have been here earlier," he said as he sat beside Father to recount The Council's final decision.

"Not surprising. Fair enough ... until the summer anyway," Father said in the end with a slight shrug.

"Had a little problem with the wife, too," Anami added, taking a light-hearted detour from the heavy subject.

"Oh? Not one of our supporters?" inquired Father.

"Oh no. Not that. Seems I've been slacking in my husbandly duties lately," he said coyly.

"Ah ha. You naughty man. All better now, I hope."

"All better now," Anami replied with a satisfied stretch.

Without looking up from his task, Father gave a quick nod in Taysha's direction.

"We'll have to get her some heavier clothes for the coming winter."

What she was wearing was fine for early spring or late fall, but it would be her death in the winter. Besides, she needed something more than one set of clothes. It would be a bit of work but he didn't mind taking care of his new daughter. He always thought if they had another child, it would be a girl.

"I guess we'll have to hunt for her too..." Anami added in a mater-of-fact tone.

Father glanced up to see Taysha washing the bowls and tending to an Amazoi version of stew. It was true she was a young woman, but more so was the truth she did not belong with the Wedic. She would never be permitted to marry among their tribe. Her only choice would be to leave one day.  
"No..." Father answered, as his head lowered back to his task, "We'll teach her how to care for herself."

\- - - - -
Taysha sat watching the two men as they ate her stew. Though their mouths said it was good, their eyes would not deceive her. Eventually, she coaxed Anami to admit it was not spicy enough for their tastes. But good none the less.

When it came time for them to leave, for some reason Father kept standing there, with his hands on his hips, looking around. Taysha quickly recognized that he was either ashamed or sad to leave her alone.

"All right," Taysha said with a smile, "I good. I vikotor."

"Victor," Anami corrected, smiling back.

"Yes. I victor. I all right."

Father looked at the ground and smacked his lips a moment or two before nodding. He gave her a quick wave and turned and walked away. Anami gave a more energetic wave and a smile, which Taysha replied to in kind. She stood at the edge of the field to watch them until they walked out of sight.

Taysha sighed and looked around: the trees, the weather, her boots on the damp grass, nothing and everything. She stood there for a while in reflection of what the two men told her about the Council's decision.

She went back to check the smoke pit that Father had made, and wondered about the usefulness of digging a trench into the ground connecting the fire to the enclosed area that held the meat. But she assumed the heat reached it properly or they wouldn't be doing it.

She opened the lid on the bowl of the remaining raw meat and checked it for bugs. She then draped some on cooking sticks, rubbed some of the non-spicy herbs on them and propped them up around the fire. It was just enough for two, one portion for her and one for her pups.

She fed them with the flesh of their own parent, which they devoured hungrily without thought. Taysha sat on her haunches and watched the macabre sight, not knowing what to think of it herself. Then she turned to her wolf skin in the field. After watching the fur wave in the wind for a while, she stood and walked over to it. The chest and hindquarters of the beast were still stained with blood. She saw that Father had sewn up the piercing she had made with her javelin.

She pulled her finger along the skin, thinking of all that had happened and of Bajesh. She then returned to check on the fire and ...

" _And, do what?"_ she thought, realizing she was simply walking back and forth. Her head filled with thoughts of her being led to kill the wolf, of sitting all day among squabbling idiots, about her taking two days to dig a bathing pool, the new smoke pit, the tools, the shelter, the pups, her healed wounds.

"How long have I been here?"

She didn't answer herself right away as she found her own language sounding foreign after listening to the rhythm of the Wedic language for so long. She stood in the windy field trying to count the days, but quickly gave up.

"Less than a month?" she assumed by the fact the _Red River_ had not yet arrived for her.

Taysha looked up at the packed, grey clouds above her. In all this time, she had yet to get any information about the Great Water. Apart from her wounds and hunger, Bajesh was the only thing that had kept her there so long. She couldn't honestly answer why that was so. Yet, she knew she couldn't leave while he was still injured. It would be cruel to him. Now his father had obviously fought so much for her, it would insult his honour to disappear. She walked back to her camp and caught herself wondering whether Bajesh would look like his father when his beard grew fully. Father was a handsome man, handsome enough for someone who looked so different from the men of her race.

With the realization her mind would not sit still on one thought, she raised her hands in the air and scrunched her mouth up to stop from screaming.

"Arg," she muttered to herself quietly, "That's why you're still here, you stupid girl! You have the mind of a bird!"

She stopped when her eyes fell on the two wolves, sitting and staring at her as though they had been with her all their lives. She stared back a moment and took a deep breath.

"This is all so strange," she said with a shrug, and a promise to befriend the two little additions to her life.

\- - - - -

It was apparent that Anami had run out of patience with words. He sat by Taysha's camp fire, more or less pretending to keep an eye on the smoke-pit. Though he wasn't being unkind or difficult, Taysha could see the constant struggle to be understood was tiring for him. It was for her as well. Anami also tried a bit too hard and took it to heart too easily when she didn't understand.

He had arrived that morning with his wife.

Her name was Amrita, and Taysha figured she was about half his age, probably closer to hers. She had brought eggs for Taysha and even said it would be a good idea for Taysha to have some geese of her own. To do that, she would need one thing beyond her control; spring. That was when the Wedic would tie their geese in the large field to the west of their village to attract new ones. That way those who had no geese could get their own. Taysha could see the dread grow on Anami's face as he tried to explain how each person or family owned their own geese and consequently the eggs they produced.

Anami looked absolutely haggard by the time the message was understood, and the group of three slipped back into that familiar dry spell in their communication. The drudgery of slow communication apparently bored Amrita, and she ended up chatting and giggling to Anami like a bird. Anami obviously liked her but she seemed to embarrass him to pieces. She constantly pinched his reddening cheeks or tugged on his beard as he looked over to Taysha with eyes pleading to make her stop. Taysha laughed despite not understanding a word she was babbling on about. She actually reminded Taysha of her best friend, Kirsha, and she found herself wanting to learn enough of the language to talk and laugh with her.

When Amrita eventually left, Taysha felt that familiar feeling of loneliness and longed for companionship with those of her own gender.

Anami took the opportunity to check the wolf meat.

It had been smoking for three days now and he deemed it cured properly. He blocked off the smoke tunnel and added two layers of rock in the deep pit and replaced the meat inside in between strips of bark.

He then covered the still warm pit with a hardened leather cover and a few heavy rocks. It was apparent that was to be her meat storage for the winter.

They sat in silence for a good while and just when Taysha figured she would go to relieve herself, a rustling in the taller grasses in the field caused her to gasp and hold her breath. Anami calmly looked back over his shoulder towards the noise and stood up. He quietly stepped over to Bajesh' hut, and without taking his eyes off the direction of the noise, he lifted up his spear with his foot and gently took it in his hand.

Taysha tried to follow his example by reaching behind her for her javelin, but her hand missed repeatedly until a louder noise convinced her to turn around and grab it.

She joined Anami by standing a spear's length to his right. She stood looking ahead, beside, and behind her until a familiar sound told them the truth of their predicament.

It was clearly a giggle.

A giggle from a child.

"Stupid kids," Anami muttered as he stepped out into the field with Taysha close behind.

"Idiots!" he shouted, "You could have been killed!"

He waved his spear to show them of the danger. One of the oldest boys stood up from the grass with the look of guilt.

"Sorry, Master-of-Arms," he said respectfully and quickly started herding the younger ones back towards the village.

Anami sighed and looked at Taysha.

"Not a bad boy," he said, noticing her still wide-eyed with a firm grip on her javelin. Something about the way she was standing, prepared to fight, made him smile.

"Aaaarg!" he yelled suddenly at her. He stretched his arms out from his sides and into the air as he threw a comical war cry into her face. Taysha's initial look of shock soon became a smile.

"Aaaarag!" she countered, mimicking his stance and making an equally comical face.

"Aaaaarg!" they chorused into the sky; at the children, at the gods, at the demons, at the depressing clouds, and leafless trees.

And then they laughed.

Anami suddenly became silent and stood looking at her. It was making Taysha a bit nervous.

"Come." he said simply as he walked to the eastern edge of the field and started stomping down grass. Taysha helped make a large circle for the two to stand in.

Without any explanation, Anami then started to show her how to hold and thrust her javelin. His usual quiet mannerisms changed to a tone more fatherly. His firm grip when he grabbed her legs and arms as he placed them in proper position caught her off guard. Up until then he had only put his hand on her shoulder or tapped her knee in a show of support. This was something quite different. She was sure it wasn't sexual. Men are gentler when doing things like that. She had simply never been manhandled before and his intense look and seriousness made her heart beat fast.

Above the unfamiliar emotions brought on by unexpected treatment, Taysha recognized that he was showing her something great. Something she wished she had known before. Something she wished her whole tribe had known.

He was teaching her how to fight.

He taught her how the position of her feet could make it easy for someone to push her to the ground or conversely make it difficult to do so. Anami had plopped her down on her ass several times, and the fact he never showed pity or sorrow for pushing her over added to the exciting mix of emotions. It was similar to the feeling the day he and Father just got up and took her out to kill the wolf. She felt a mixture of happiness at being included and confusion for not treated as a woman should. Perhaps it was not being treated as a _weaker creature_ that excited her the most.

After each trip or push, there was no show of concern if she was all right, nor did he look at her as if he expected her to cry. No, he just motioned for her to stand, "blah-blah-blah" as he pointed out details and then plop, down she would go again.

Her eagerness and smiles at every instruction encouraged Anami to show her more and more.

Their relationship as teacher and pupil was born.

\- - - - -

It was unknown to Taysha at this time, but the Wedic tribe had all either trained under Anami, his father, or his grandfather. A few of the elderly men had even sat at the feet of his great-great grandfather to learn the arts of fighting. Every member practiced as a child, topless regardless of season, with a thick woven pants to make them sweat.

The girls practiced until puberty. After which, they covered their breasts and began to learn the duties of a woman. Most of them were only more than happy to stop the almost daily regiment of pain and discomfort.

Perhaps this was the reason for Anami's fascination with Taysha. A young Wedic woman of her age would be thinking more of marriage and babies than of spear wielding.

Tactics of larger warfare had become theory to the remnants of this nomadic people from the East, but their knowledge of single combat had been the sole reason for their survival up to this time. The years of moving up, back, and around every hostile valley and pass of the mountains saw to that. Each Wedic man could wound an attacker and move to the next in succession, leaving a group of assailants scattered over the battlefield.

Anami was now the great, but un-needed, Master-of-Arms of a peaceful people hiding out of harm's way. He was confident that if all the men studied the arts of battle beyond their day of marriage, they could have more than a piece of land with their backs to a fruitless mountain. Nevertheless, the Council would not permit its children to go looking for war and understandably so. The whole tribe, including Anami, was still feeling the loss of the Last Ambush of so long ago.

The screams of those not fortunate enough to escape that day fuelled those left alive to train in these arts of war. Anami's concern was now for the newest generation. Would a lifetime of peace erode the will to subject themselves constantly to such a harsh exercise?

\- - - - -
Anami had led Taysha back to the fire to eat, all the while she pleaded with him for more instruction.

Before Anami could lose his composure over her persistence, he seemed to come up with a solution, "Yes. Yes. Okay, okay... Look here, girl." He put the end of a stick on the dry ground around the fire and drew out a map.

"Here. This is the village. The river south of the village, and where we are here, to the east. On the opposite side of the village are the Training Grounds ... ah, you don't understand. Training area?" He stopped to think of alternate words but resorted to making sounds of a battle.

"Swish-bash-crash-clang-clang. All right? Here."

He pointed to the little circle he had drawn on the west side of the village.

"Tomorrow. Sun. About here." He pointed to the sky at what Taysha would have described as the Second Movement of the Sun, or sometime before midday.

"You. Sneaking." He pranced around pretending to hide behind his hands, "Sneaking to here. And watch. Watch."

"Sneeken," she said enthusiastically with a smile.

"Yes, yes. Sneaking. To the field. Practice what you see."

That was yesterday evening.

A lifetime ago.

Taysha glanced up from her shelter at the cloudy sky. She was sure the sun hadn't even crested the eastern mountains yet.

She had already been up, started her camp fire, the fire by the bath, organised the heating rocks, made breakfast, and constructed a small shelter for her pups.

In all honesty, she had no idea why she was so excited. She didn't know if it was a battle, or training, or some kind of ceremony she was supposed to go watch. Whatever it was, Taysha couldn't restrain herself any longer. She grabbed her Wedic hat that Father had brought her and made her way along the route that Anami had drawn out for her.

The rain was falling steadily as she made her way across the opposite side of the Wedic river and down around the village to the place Anami showed her to go.

There she hid where the forest led into a huge open field towards the west.

From where she sat, she could see a well-worn path leading into the Wedic village. At the end sat a hard-packed, dirt clearing with six bare poles standing straight up in a ring. Around them sat five log-half benches in a semi-circle.

There was no one there, but Taysha didn't mind. The openness of the field gave her an indescribable peace, even in the drizzle. It wasn't long before her chin hung to her chest and she dozed off.

She was woken to the energetic sounds of children laughing and playfully screaming.

Taysha rubbed her eyes as a group of shirtless boys ran down the path with wooden staffs in hand, striking at one pole, yelling and jumping from one to the next as they moved around in a circle. They were followed more pristinely by Anami, surrounded by the girls of the village. He was followed by two young men, that appeared to be his helpers. They were handsome and Taysha figured them closer to Brother's age.

The three men quickly organised the constantly moving children into groups and exercises, shouting orders and encouragement until they actually started to steam in the winter rain. Taysha had never seen anything like it. Did all the children in the village do this? They looked quite comfortable in the freezing weather as Anami led them through one drill after another.

There was a time of striking, a time to climb the poles, even a time to hang from the cut pieces that were joined in between some of them like branches. They would lift themselves up and over them. Taysha noted with jealously the girls were doing it as easily as the boys. Anami helped the younger ones and when he was busy, one of his two helpers moved in to help.

The older children were paired up and stood facing each other with wooden swords and small round shields. Taysha recalled that at her age, the Amazoi boys and girls took to playing at the Children's Camp, _pretending_ to be adults. What she was witnessing now completely engulfed her attention. These children looked fiercer than the strongest men of her village as they leaped and lunged at each other with yells and shrieks.

She noted especially the instruction given by Anami.

It was like the instruction Taysha had received the day before: details of the positions of the hand, the position of the weapon when using it for defence and when attacking, positions of the feet. Balance. Always balance.

Using a weapon for a defensive-attack was a fantastic concept for Taysha. Parrying blows with the purpose of attacking, compared to the natural instinct to block-regroup-then-attack, saved a complete step. Anami's movements were so overlapped it was difficult to distinguish where the defence ended and the attack began.

It seemed she had just begun to watch when Anami clapped his hands and yelled something to everyone. All the children cheered. The boys ran off towards their village in a pack, while the girls remained to cover themselves. Taysha thought the differences between the genders rather cute. At the same time she admired these people who seemed to not differentiate so much between trivial gender tasks.

After everyone had made his or her way up the hill, she saw Anami scanning the area where he thought Taysha was hiding. She sat perfectly still in the shade of a tree with her bear-fur cloak pulled up to her cheeks. She was hoping he wouldn't find her. It was a game of hide and seek. She knew he had when he looked straight at her briefly, then stopped searching. He quickly broke eye contact with her and helped his assistants carry the training weapons back to the village.

A wry smile crossed Taysha's lips. She was ecstatic. She ran back to her field and practiced all that she could remember. She went back and forth from the open field to hitting trees, to trying to pull herself up on a branch at least once.

When Anami finally showed up to visit, she said she would go see the next day as well, but Anami told her it was a holiday.

The simple reply turned into another lengthy discussion on Wedic measurements of time and dates and what an established day of rest meant. Taysha was surprised to find this tribe grouped four or five sets of days within one moon cycle, taking every sixth day to put aside heavy chores, hunting and training for a social day of feasting and relaxing.

Anami also taught her something about their ability to use the stars to navigate with, as their ancestors had.

Travelling vast plains --that he described as very, very, very large fields-- they had no markings to lead them apart from the stars.

As Anami started over-explaining again, her mind started to wander. She noticed she was making comparisons between Bajesh and Anami like one of the older girls in her tribe did when she decided her old lover wasn't as good as the new boy she had become interested in. Taysha shifted uncomfortably in her seat at the thought of what kind of horrible woman she was to become attracted to anyone after what she had been through.

"...after The Dark Sea..."

The word from Anami's lips re-captured her attention.

"Sea?" Taysha repeated, recognising the word from somewhere. "What is sea?"

"Big, big, big water. No mountains. No trees. Only water."

"Taste salty," Taysha said overlapping. She remembered the word from Bajesh.

"I want go sea," she said firmly.

"Ah..." Anami replied with a quick wobble of his head. He instantly understood the look on her face to be very serious, and it was most likely her purpose for coming over the mountain in the first place. He thought a bit, realizing he had become fond of the barbarian girl, and that he was unwise to become any more attached. She would have to leave one day, just as Father had said.

"The Dark Sea is ... hmm. It is a difficult journey. A lot of hostile tribes on the coast."

This took a lot of explaining but he took his time to do it properly as he saw her sincere desire to go there.

The Wedic had met with constant resistance when they tried to follow the coastline north and that was when there were four or five times as many of them. It was no place for a single tribe to be wandering, let alone a young girl. He knew she wouldn't get far, but he reminded himself to be honest because the gods were now testing him. He had better not discourage someone who had such an obvious destiny. After all, she had succeeded in getting this far. With the guidance of the gods, she could go wherever they led her.

Anami explained that he had seen the Dark Sea from its shore. The journey he had made from there to the place he sat that day with Taysha took about 30 years.

When the number was understood by Taysha, her mouth dropped open.

"Firty-yars," she whispered, as she retraced the thirty lines Anami had drawn in the ground. He couldn't help but laugh out loud at her astonishment. Anami was quick to inform her that five years consisted of blocked routes, getting lost, settling through winters, confronting hostile peoples, bartering passage, and staying by a lake for two years. There was also the five years they had settled in the Flatlands, before being chased off by a union of native tribes. The remaining twenty were the years they occupied the valley they now lived in.

Eventually Anami figured out he could probably make it back to the Dark Sea in around three months if he didn't get lost or encounter any trouble along the way.

But, of course, that was a dream situation.

Even so, he mapped a rough route for Taysha.

Starting from the Wedic village, he led her imagination across the large field beside the Training Grounds, down a steep ravine, to a great river in the valley to the west. Following that river, he took her south past a large lake. It was here his words faltered...

"Bad men," he said, quietly counting on his fingers, "Many. Many."

It was painfully clear the girl could not possibly make the journey. Even if she started in the spring, was able to avoid being seen any one of the numerous tribes along the way, eventually winter would catch her. If her path didn't give her away, the smoke from her fire eventually would.

Risking an offence to the gods, Anami made an alternate suggestion, "You can stay here. It's good here..."

Seeing the conflicted look in Taysha's eyes, he realized he had crossed a line.

The girl had asked a question that Anami knew the answer to. It was his duty to give the information, not to sit and judge what is best for her.

But his lips would not obey his command to continue.

Without finishing his map, Anami announced it was time for him to go home.

As he left, Taysha gave him a silent wave with a subtle look of sorrow in her eyes, she then turned to the fire to more clearly see her thoughts.

The first thing she noticed was that after having company all day, the loneliness felt almost unnatural. She thought it better if no one ever came so she wouldn't feel lonely when they left.

"No," she told herself and the cubs. "It's better to have companionship for a short time than emptiness forever."

Her mind led her along the three-month, non-stop walk through endless mountains and Hoorg-like tribes. She could just as easily be taken captive by one of them, as by the Hoorg. Of course, it could have happened with the Wedic but they shooed her away. Thinking about it, it was most likely what would have happened if a dirty, sick girl had suddenly shown up at the Amazoi village too.

She figured she could easily avoid any villages along the way, but it was the quiet hunting parties of men that she feared. They could make evil use of her before returning to their wives and children. The thought made her wonder if any of the Amazoi men had done something as unspeakable as that.

Taysha found herself breathing heavily again as she did when following thoughts of that sort.

She then caught the look of the female wolf.

"I'm just tired," she said to her and tried to stop the images from running around in her head like a crazed animal. A yawn from the pup told her it was time for bed. She threw them some scraps of meat that they quickly gobbled down.

"Hm... I'm going to have to find names for you two one day," she thought as she turned into her shelter and lowered the flap.

\- - - - -
Taysha's trips to watch the training broke up the next few mornings of loneliness and feeling in the doldrums. Regardless of the weather, the children would gather and practice shirtless. They were all full of energy and fun. Taysha watched diligently to the end and was a little disappointed if she missed catching Anami's eye before he left. She would then run back and practice what she had seen earlier that day.

Her arm had healed, leaving a small scar. There was no pain in her wrist. The swelling in her ankles had gone down long ago. And the first few days of soreness from training her body to fight had lessened. After sitting in the chill of her sweaty clothes the first couple days after training, she had taken to following the example of the children. Taking it one step further, she removed her only pair of pants and boots and trained in her loincloth. At first she started by leaping around like the children but it hurt her breasts after a while. She figured it explained why she didn't see any girls of Age training and she resorted to smoother movements.

She found the cold of the earth on her feet and the winter air on her back prompted her, like a teacher, to keep moving. She limited her actions to what Anami had showed her. She struck at invisible posts and enemies as she manoeuvred Bajesh's heavy spear. She felt the bottoms of her feet harden from the ground beneath her and her forearms and chest muscles draw tight from the weight of the weapon's movement. The blisters she had made on her soft hands days before had calloused and her legs constantly ached from rebuilding their strength. She could feel sore muscles in her back, neck, sides and stomach that she never knew she had. And she loved every moment of it.

Following the moves she had remembered like the steps of a dance, she jumped out of the way of the oncoming sweeps and strikes of her unseen opponents. She would only stop for a mouthful of food or to go to the bathroom. When she felt she had done enough, she would run to her river and light the bath fire. While she waited for the rocks to heat, she tried to lift herself up by a branch or lift heavy rocks because Anami had told her that would build her strength.

"Man. Woman. Same body. Different shape," Anami had explained to her simply, "If I lift heavy rocks, I am strong. If you lift heavy rocks, you are strong. Easy."

This new idea that the accomplishments of the men were only unmatched by the women because of their lack of training intrigued Taysha and gave her a new hope. As she lifted a large stone with both hands up and down over her head, she told herself that she could be the victor from then on. Just as she had never heard of a woman killing a wolf, she had never heard of a woman killing a man either. Now that didn't mean it couldn't be done, only that it hadn't been done yet.

Just as she had killed a wolf, she could kill a man in battle. Not just any man. It would be one arrogant and stupid enough to stand between her and the Dark Sea.

The stone hung heavy in her hands as she thought of her plans to get to the Great Water. Conversely, what would stop her from going back to find the Hoorg village? To kill them? To free those who had been taken captive? Would it be possible?

"Taysha!"

The sudden, yet quiet voice of Bajesh made her turn around. There stood Bajesh, leaning on the arm of his mother. His mother stood smiling, yet noticeably uncomfortable having approached Taysha when she was half-naked. Taysha didn't have time to notice the finer nuances. Steaming from the sweat and cold, she bounded over to him and embraced him, careful not to catch his wounded arm between them. The rain dripped on them as they stood, holding each other in silence. Taysha stood back and wiped a tear of joy from her eye.

"Rain," she said, "Come. My camp. Shelter."

She linked arms with him and held herself close. She pushed her naked breast into his arm as they walked. Apparently not only she and Bajesh noticed.

"Maybe you should put on some cloth," Mother suggested.

"No. Too hot." Taysha replied innocently. At least, she tried to make it sound that way.

Mother smiled politely in reply as the two young ones started talking between themselves. She had originally planned just to walk Bajesh over and leave them to talk but seeing the topless, strong-willed girl that had replaced the weak barbarian that Taysha used to be, she decided to stay a bit longer.

Bajesh sat uncomfortably with Mother at his shelter and tried to talk normally to Taysha as she stood across from them.

Still naked but for the loincloth, she excitedly showed them some of the moves she had learned from Anami and from watching the Training. Bajesh, though equally embarrassed at the display, recited the names of some of the moves and exercises. The Wolf's Bite, the Bear Walk, and the Crow Strike. It was all a good vocabulary lesson for her as well. Until Mother finally broke.

"Taysha, you need to put something on. It's not proper." The instinctive challenging look on Taysha's face quickly faded when she saw how nervous Bajesh and Mother were. Somehow she went from needing them to not really caring what they thought. She knew that sort of attitude would have resulted in a swollen face by her father's hand if he had been there to witness his daughter's behaviour.

"Bajesh..." Mother called his attention, "Explain to her what I mean."

Before he could say anything, Taysha was already at her shelter, picking up her tunic.

"I un'stand _proper_." she said as held out her tunic, "I sweaty. Only one cloth, I have." she explained as she obeyed Mother's command.

Taysha appreciated the sheepish look Mother gave when she realized Taysha did have a good reason not to put it on. After all, it was the mother and son who arrived unannounced. The look on Mother's face told Taysha she would not be asked again.

Bajesh was quick to deflect the awkward moment to the wolf cubs sitting and looking at him.

"They're not scared?" he asked surprised at their docility.

"They hope food. ' _Give me food'_ , they say." Taysha replied.

"Do they bite?" Mother asked, thankful to move the attention away from Taysha's brashness.

"No. No bite. They nice. No hurt you," Taysha answered, losing any hint of venom in her voice.

"You've learned a lot more words," noted Bajesh.

"Yes. Anami. Father. Teach me very many. Small time. Many words. Now I speak. Is good." She said with a smile.

Minding her manners, Taysha handed them some smoked wolf meat and started to prepare the tea. Mother looked at the meat of a predator in shock, then back to Bajesh.

Bajesh returned a definite look of _'Don't you dare'_.

"I learn fight. Anami teach me," Taysha started before the wolf-meat issue could be bothered over.

"He's a very good teacher," remarked Mother, with a pleading look to her son.

"Yes. Strong man. Good man. And Father."

Taysha calling her husband "Father" seemed to catch Mother off guard. She was a special young woman to be sure. Mother would watch with interest the unravelling of her tale.

Taysha went over to the cubs and untied their leashes and brought one to each of them.

"This Ushi," she said as she handed the larger male to Bajesh. "And this Wada," she said as she gave Ushi's little sister to Mother. "Ushi means Big ... Wada means Water."

At mentioning the names, Taysha became a little more serious. "You understand Dark Sea?" she asked, suddenly changing topics.

Bajesh and mother both nodded.

"West." Taysha confirmed, "I go. Be strong and go."

In the silence that followed her comment, Taysha clapped her hands together, "Oh no," she stated, "I forget spear ... is all right. I bath time now. I come back. You eat. Drink. Wait. Ushi and Wada, all right?" she added, pointing to the cubs before running off to take her bath.

As she ran, Taysha guessed she had said too much in her excitement at finally seeing Bajesh and her weariness from training. She had caught the sad look on his face the moment she said she would leave. He had just healed and come to visit her and she had succeeded in making him sad. It was true.

"Well, she seems... healthy." Mother said with a most recognisable hint of secondary meaning.

"Eight days of being in bed," Bajesh answered plainly, "Now I find Taysha has gone and this new woman has come and taken her place."

\- - - - -
Mother brought Bajesh back to the village that night. For the next couple of days he came out either with his mother or father. He wanted to come out alone but his fear of being caught by another wolf outweighed the discomfort he got from arriving unannounced in front of a topless Taysha who was always practising in her field. He quickly learned not to come just before or during the Children's Training because she would leave to watch, no matter what they were talking about.

His father had jokingly said he should make Taysha a piece of "breast armour" after his first experience of seeing her jump around topless in the cold. He also figured she should have a knife of her own. In all honesty, he figured she should have been given a knife from the start. It was something the Wedic never left their hut without. So for the last few days, he had forged a long thin knife with a sturdy handle and guard. It was thin enough to penetrate easily and sturdy enough to kill.

Taysha was overjoyed with her new gift and put it in the rabbit-fur wrapping of her boot. She was even happier the day Mother brought her more eggs and a fish. She had no fish in her little creek. There were none at the larger stream that the village used either. One had to go a day away to the large river in the valley below to get them.

Father was pleased to see she had her wolf skin hanging proudly on the post of her shelter but the condition of the shelter itself made him think.

"We should make you a better home for the winter," he said to her one day as they sat with Bajesh for tea.

"Hmm," she answered, not fully understanding.

"It's dangerous and foolish to travel in the winter. For man or woman," Father said, in clear reference to her plan to leave.

"Besides, it will give you more time to train," threw in Bajesh, cradling Wada, his favourite of the two cubs.

"Stay longer. Longer training. Stronger Taysha," Father added, hoping it tempted her to stay.

Taysha smiled, still not really knowing what led them to state the obvious.

"Yes. All right. One winter. I now 15 winter." She hoped that would satisfy whatever misunderstanding they seemed to be having and quickly changed subjects.

"Bajesh. How many winter you?" she asked.

"Uh, well I was 14, but I just turned 15 this summer. This is my 16th winter, I guess," he answered.

"Ugh. Too much." She waved her hands around as if bees were attacking her.

"Too many word. Fou'teen, five-teen, sixteen..." she counted back to him on her fingers. "You choose one!" she demanded, holding all her fingers out to him to choose with a big smile on her face.

Father laughed so hard a piece of meat flew out of his mouth and into the fire. Bajesh smiled back at Taysha and leaned over and pinched her extended middle finger.

"Sixteen. I'm 16 winters now."

"Now? 16 winters?" she repeated. "Good. You? Old," she said pointing to him. "Me? Young," she pointed at herself proudly. It was an obvious display of affection for Bajesh, which he greatly appreciated even though this girl he so dearly liked once again squatted on her haunches in her tunic, sans loincloth, in front of them.

" _At least she has her tunic on..."_ Bajesh thought helplessly.

Father decided it was time for him to move and he went to the field and started cutting the long grass and bundling it together. Bajesh noticed his father had moved because he had become uncomfortable with Taysha's immodesty. Bajesh thought it was time to say something.

"Taysha..." he said quietly as he pointed at the bottom of her tunic. Taysha looked down to notice she was giving him a clear view of herself and quickly pushed the fabric down between her thighs. The look of mock embarrassment indicated she thought it funny rather than embarrassing and it prompted Bajesh to say more.

"You can't do that, Taysha. It's very embarrassing for us."

Her smile vanished.

"I'm sorry," Bajesh added, "We're a different people, you and us. Do you understand? It's just different customs. Please cover yourself."

Taysha was angry because she wasn't exactly doing it on purpose and it all seemed a rather big deal over nothing.

But the sincerity in Bajesh's voice soothed her pride and she nodded back. With that, the two had once more grown silent. That was until Taysha started smiling at him as she crouched by the fire.

"What?" he queried as he broke into a smile himself.

"Woat?" she mimicked him in a mocking wide-eyed look.

"Wow. I think I liked you more when you didn't speak," he blurted out.

"What?" she asked normally, "Too much. Too much. Talk slowly."

"Oh. It's nothing. It was a bad joke," he smiled up at her from the fire.

"Bad what?" she asked.

"Joke ... haha. Funny," he explained.

"Ah. Funny. All right. No funny," she replied in a half question, understanding it was something he didn't want to repeat. In an impulse she grabbed the end of her tunic and quickly lifted it up and brought it back down.

"Whoops!" she cooed with a mischievous smile before sitting down with a plop in her shelter. She pulled one knee up so she could rest her cheek on it as she looked at him. Bajesh was looking purposefully at the cub as he shook his head. Taysha was briefly worried she might have offended him but an uncontrollable smile spread across his face. Though relieved to see him smile, she knew she was letting her excitement of him overpower her. If she wasn't careful, she would make him hate her.

"Bad joke?" she asked.

Before he could reply she added, "I sorry. I am happy. You here with me," she said, relieved to have finally said it.

"I am very, very happy," he replied, adding another quick look at the opening at the bottom of her tunic. "Now put on some pants," he added.

"No!" she joked back as she stuck out her tongue and pretended to flash her breasts at him.

" _You_ take off cloth," she retorted, "Good for you."

"Yeah, maybe when my arm's healed."

His sudden boldness seemed to make his face flush.

Taysha smiled at the innocent young man.

"Yes. When arm is good. We do bath. With you."

Bajesh attempted to look back over his shoulder to see if his father was within hearing distance.

"Don't worry," Taysha reassured, "It is sneek'n," she added with her finger to her mouth. "Shhh. Shhhh."

"A secret?" he queried. "It's a secret?"

"No sekret. Sneek'n," she answered and pretended to move about like a rabbit trying to hide.

"Oh! Yes. _Sneaking_. We'll _sneak_ over to the bath, because it's a secret," he said.

"Yeah. Sneek'n causesa secret," she repeated and broke into laughter.

It was the first time in Bajesh's life when he wished the coming winter would last forever.

\- - - - -
Over the days, before the first snow had fallen, Bajesh had healed well enough both in body and in mind to visit Taysha on his own. Even so, he would always take his spear.

He usually wandered over at midday after he had finished his chores. Although he knew not to expect Taysha there when the children were having their training sessions, he was happy to prepare tea and a hot meal for her while he waited. Bajesh hadn't trained since he was thirteen and he was glad not to. It was a lot of work and pain and he found it interesting that Taysha was so obsessed by it.

Anami had brought her an ointment for her sore muscles. It was a smell Bajesh associated with the men of the village and it took some getting used to having Taysha reek of the stuff. It smelled bad, having sheep urine mixed in it, and it stung the skin. But it worked. The next morning your muscles would be back to normal.

Father came out every day to help Taysha collect rocks by the river to make her hut with. Taysha carried them in a sack, which supported the weight on a strap that went over her forehead. For days her neck muscles were so sore she had trouble chewing her food and had to stick to the softer meals such as stews.

Soon enough a semi-circle of stones, inlaid in a trench, had started growing in the field beside the entrance to her camping area. She didn't much like the idea of being in the open but realized they couldn't put a proper hut in the place she was in now without cutting down a couple of trees or digging up roots. In doing so, it would put her pretty much in the same surroundings as at the corner of the field anyway. At first, the hut entrance faced west in the direction of the village, which she also didn't like because it felt people could walk straight up the now established path from the village and see right into her hut. Father patiently filled in the original foundation trench and re-dug it so the entrance would face south.

Word had circulated among the Wedic village that Taysha was training in the martial arts, topless, like a child. This brought the odd expedition of young boys and girls to peer out at her from the safety of the forest. Usually they would end up being chased away by either Bajesh, or Father.

On one of the Wedic holidays, while Taysha was training alone, the young boy who had come with the very first group about a month earlier returned once again with the usual kids. With no sign of Taysha's male guardians, they were making little effort to conceal themselves and stood at the far end of the field quietly talking to each other as they watched. The young ones liked to giggle at her bouncy breasts but the older boy saw her sincere attempt at training. No other woman of age had done so and he was duly impressed.

Eventually he could restrain himself no longer.

"You're doing it wrong!" he yelled suddenly, making the young ones around him jump. A couple of the boys started to run back towards the village as Taysha lowered her spear and looked over with an air of annoyance.

"What?" she yelled back, "I not un'erstand."

"No. Not _'I not un'erstand'_. It's _'I don't understand',_ " he corrected her in a loud clear voice. A few of the other children started to laugh, thinking he was making fun of her until they saw his face. He was quite simply helping her.

"I. Don't. Understand!" she shouted back, just as loud. She then rolled her eyes and started to turn her back on him. The boy leaped forward through the grass, getting snow all over him in the process. He was followed shortly by a bewildered group of kids exchanging glances as they did when they knew the day would end with everybody getting into trouble.

"You're doing it wrong," he repeated.

"I not ... I don't understand," she corrected herself, looking the boy over. He was about 12 winters and almost her height.

"Here, let me show you." He reached up to take her spear and to steal a closer glance at her bare breasts.

Taysha gave her weapon to the boy and crossed her arms over her chest with a stern glare. She hated the Wedic for making her as self-conscious as them about having her top off.

The boy motioned her to stand back as the other children did instinctively. He swung the spear over his head as easily as she had done and matching the timing with the motion of the spear, he spun his body around to face the opposite direction.

"See? You move with the swing. Not against it. That takes too much energy. You understand? You want to move together. The spear's movement will then carry you around. Got it?"

He handed the spear back to her. Taysha took the weapon and sighed at the boy as he snuck in another look at her.

" _Really,"_ she thought with a slight 'tsk', _"A boy his age should be past the Moon Stares."_

"Move together," he repeated as he took a step back.

She tried, but unsuccessfully. It was discouraging to do this in front of her uninvited audience. She didn't fully understand what it was she should be doing and stopping to listen to the boy's explanation meant her body felt the cold.

"No, no!" The boy barged back in before she could finish.

He showed her the wrong way by imitating her. Taysha heard some of the other children giggle but she was relieved to notice it wasn't in a spiteful way. Then he showed her the right way by doing it properly again. Taysha quickly caught the comparison between what she was doing and the way it should be done. She understood. She tried and failed again. But she noticed the difference in the feeling of her legs. The way the boy showed her, she was more balanced, smoother. The boy also saw she had understood well enough and this time said nothing to her. He just stood nodding until she had finished the steps she had remembered.

"It's fine," he said when she had finished, "It's harder than it looks. Do you have another spear?"

Taysha just looked back blankly with a slight hint of annoyance at him still being there.

"A.NO.THER SPEAR?" He over-accentuated.

Taysha grimaced, but pointed to the fire under the trees at her camp. He ran off to get it, and as he ran back he told the others about her wolf cubs. The kids went wild and ran off towards the camp. Taysha started to move over to shoo them away before they got into her things and scared the pups. But she found they had all stopped in a well-mannered huddle just outside the natural separation between the forest and her home. It was obviously difficult for them to see the cubs at the same time so they kept jostling for position.

"All right. Let's try from the beginning." The boy started again and took the first position with his left foot forward, right foot back and held the spear with the tip low to the ground.

"One!" he commanded and they both stepped forward while bringing the spear tip up in a thrust.

Taysha tried to carry on as she had seen them all do every morning, yet at every move the boy would stop her.

"No. No. No."

He was onto her again, readjusting her grip or her stance or pointing to where she should be looking, "Slow first. Speed comes later, all right?"

"I no know what is 'speed,'" she mumbled, really feeling the cold now, thanks to his continual checks.

"I don't know what 'speed' means," he corrected her.

"Idon'know wha'speedmeans," she chattered through it.

"Speed means fast. Do you understand fast?"

"Yes."

"All right then. Slow now. FAST LATER!"

"You don't have to say it loud," she mumbled in her native language. "I'm not an idiot."

The boy ignored her mutterings.

"One!"

She jumped instantly into the first move.

"Two! Three! Four!"

Taysha continued until she started making large mistakes and then the boy would correct her and take her back to one again.

She was grateful to find the warmth of training envelope her as the number of steps increased. Better still, the other kids started to grow bored and leave, or started playing house in the foundations of Taysha's roofless hut.

By the end of the day, the boy who was instructing Taysha had taken her through all sixty-three steps of the individual spear exercise. Far more than she had even seen up to now.

Sensing it time to leave, the boy handed Taysha the javelin he had been using, and called the remaining kids to go back without a further word to her.

"Thank you." Taysha said as he started walking away. He smiled and raised his chin towards her.

Taysha smiled and shook her head in spite of herself. She figured her lesson was an even trade for the constant peeks the boy had taken.

\- - - - -
The next evening Anami came out with Father and Taysha asked about the boy. He told her that his name was Dinesh. She also learned it was the same name as the Council elder. In fact, the boy was the Council elder's great-grandson. The Wedic called him Little Dinesh. Anami spoke well of Little Dinesh. Apparently he had expressed an interest in being one of Anami's helpers when he came of Age.

"He's very good. Very disciplined," Anami told her before turning to Father.

"That sneaky wolf," he added with a laugh, "He didn't tell me anything about helping her."

Taysha had been told the other kids' names but had forgotten them all. Over time, their little adventures visiting the topless barbarian were made known to the village and most of the children were banned from going again. For the obvious reason of being the Chief Council's great-grandson, Dinesh was one of those forbidden by his parents. And Taysha missed the welcomed instruction.

Bajesh was relieved to see Taysha finally practising with a top wrapping on. Though he thanked her for her consideration of their culture, the truth was she used it for the more uncomfortable jumping techniques. For exercises like the pull-up, she found it just got in the way.

Bajesh got a little nervous when Taysha told him a couple of the older boys had come to watch her from a distance. She had sent them on their way with a challenging stare, but to Bajesh's horror, she confessed she would have appreciated some help from them. She said she missed the regular lessons from young Dinesh and Anami hardly came by any more. Though she continued to train and lift rocks at all times throughout the day, she wasn't learning anything new and there was no one there to tell her what she was doing wrong.

Bajesh made sure to visit Anami that night to tell him that Taysha desperately wanted to be taught by him. In all honesty, it was more to ensure no one else got brave like Little Dinesh and offered her help. Bajesh could trust Anami. After all, he already had one of the prettiest girls in the village for a wife. Why would he need two?

Seeing her dedication to practising the Arts, Anami agreed to spend time teaching her details and other things she couldn't get from hiding in the grass and watching the children train. He also marked out four points for holes in her field to put in poles like the Training Grounds. Taysha had hoped he would spend the time training and teaching her more techniques, but he started her digging instead.

"Techniques are nothing without Strength. Strength is nothing without Stamina. Stamina is nothing without Technique. First, you dig," he said, handing her the long-nosed iron shovel.

Taysha looked at him suspiciously out of the corner of her eye as she took it. But she did as she was told, and soon her aching shoulders and back sang out to her of the coming rewards of strength.

Anami was pleased to see Taysha never asked, _'Is this good enough?'_ like others near her age. She was on her knees digging deep into the earth with her hands, and had to be told to stop and move on to the next hole.

With four holes dug, Anami pointed out the first tree for her to cut down. As she went to get an axe, Anami inspected the thick bundle of tied grass that Father had made for her archery.

"How is your archery coming?" he called back to Taysha.

"Arshry?" she asked confused.

"Your arrow practice. Archery."

"Ah! Good. Better," she called and turned to her tree.

"We'll have to get you to practice on moving targets then."

"Hm." was all Taysha had to offer in reply. All her focus was on the tree, and it quickly became apparent she had never cut a tree down. Anami walked over to show her how to hold the axe, how to turn her hips, and how to avoid cutting her leg.

And that was how Bajesh saw them when he came up the path and into view. Anami greeted the young man as he stepped away from Taysha awkwardly. Taysha took no notice of either of them as she set to try out her new techniques on the tree. Trying to make a position for himself among the two, Bajesh offered his help, but Taysha refused.

He made small-talk with Anami for a while as they stood in the drizzle, watching Taysha at her toils. But the uncomfortable timing in which Bajesh had arrived lingered between them.

Anami eventually said it was getting late, pointed out the three immediate trees he thought best for her Training Grounds, and said he would be back after training the next day to help post them properly.

Having received her work-load, Taysha bid farewell and returned to felling her first tree.

Bajesh, seeing Taysha would be absorbed in her task for some time, turned his attentions to working on the framework of her hut roof.

Cuts ran up and down the side of the trunk until Taysha had improved the aim of her swing. In the typical fashion of one new problem replacing a solved one; the tree finally broke, only to fall upright with its branches caught on the other trees. Taysha swore and pulled, and cursed and yanked, until she had finally pulled it to the ground. Worn out and her hands shaking from the work, she left it where it lay and walked back to Bajesh.

She stood quietly watching him adjusting the thin poles that had been planted in the stone wall. He was pulling them gently together to form the dome of her roof, then re-fastening them with twine. He worked slowly and carefully, so as not to break any. Taysha couldn't help notice how he worked on things. In comparison, she noticed her own energy was becoming far too aggressive.

With his hands holding the last two poles in place above his head, Bajesh stopped to give Taysha a smile. Seeing how haggard she looked, he glanced up at the sky to check the time of day. It was well past time for the evening meal.

"You want to have your bath?" he asked, "I'll make us something to eat."

Taysha gave a tired smile and staggered off to camp.

While Taysha went off to the river, Bajesh tended to dinner. The fire for the bathing rocks soon reflected off the distant trees in the surrounding dark. She came back shortly after and they ate. All the while Taysha sat with her cheek resting on her knee as she waited for the rocks to heat.

"Your hut will be ready soon, " Bajesh mentioned, "We'll need Father and Anami to help us bend the roof lower first. Maybe tomorrow," he said, looking up at the darkening sky.

"Yes." replied Taysha, "We do bath," she added sleepily.

Seeing there would be little conversation that night, Bajesh helped gather their cloths, soaps and ointments, and headed to the bathing area. He noticed she had an impressive supply of firewood. No doubt from her strength-training. She had collected enough not to have to gather any more for a month, even with the fires burning day and night. The level of her exertion showed in the difficulty for her to undo her book laces. Her hands were bent and calloused like an old man's.

"Just a moment." Bajesh said, putting down the drying cloth on the log pile. "I'm going to get something."

"Where you go?" Taysha called after him.

"Just going to get something," he yelled back as he ran back towards the camp. He ran into his shelter and dug through his bag of things. He pulled out a pipe and a small jar with a lid and dashed back to Taysha.

Taysha was dropping rocks into the pool, looking at him with tired and questioning eyes.

"Hemp," he said to Taysha.

"Hemp," she copied the unfamiliar word dryly.

"For smoking. Medicine. For journey inside."

"Hmmm," she replied without much conviction and leaned over to smell the contents of the jar that Bajesh had held out for her. She took a short cautious sniff and then inhaled the aroma deeply with a smile and a knowing nod.

"Taja," she said in her language as Bajesh filled the small slender pipe with the cannabis and sprinkled little pieces of hash on top. He then took a burning stick from the fire and lit it, inhaling deeply. He passed the pipe to Taysha.

"Phewwwww!" Cough, cough, cough.

Taysha laughed and she started to inhale herself but the first tickle of smoke on the top of her throat sent her coughing along in unison. She tried to make a better show of it but each attempt to inhale sent her into a coughing fit. Bajesh was already giggling at her attempts to smoke in between coughs.

"You're such a girl," she said to him in Osfer without thought much about it.

"Daybinshano-buggie-wuggie," Bajesh jokingly mimicked the sound of her language. It was so out of character it caught Taysha by surprise as she stared at him with a crooked smile as smoke leaked out of the corner of her mouth. Bajesh laughed and she snorted. The sound coming from her own nose startled her.

Something wasn't right. It felt as though her mind was swimming in a strong current and she desperately wanted to grab hold of something to steady her. She knew cannabis and what it did, but this was something different. It had hit her terribly fast. She tried to focus on tree branches or the fire but the movement of both made her feel like she was sinking into the ground. Bajesh saw her sudden change of emotion and through dreamy eyes he spoke as if he had read her thoughts, swaying his hands and arms like the movements of a branch in the wind.

"It's all right. It's a river. Follow the river. Go. With. Riverrrrr," he said slowly, sweeping his hand out from his chest and into the air, "Swooooosh."

Taysha felt as if her soul had been pulled backwards though her body even though she hadn't moved. Bajesh was talking, but Taysha wasn't really sure if he was talking to ghosts, or himself, or to her.

She broke her gaze away from him and tried to calm her swaying soul by looking at the fire. It seemed to be alive. Just like her father had once told her.

"Amazing," she thought, "Is this how father saw the fire? Did he see the world like this?"

She had always felt her father, like most men of the Amazoi, were simply indifferent and aloof. Over the months of hardship and new experience of 'manly' labour, it had become clear to her now: the hunt, her first kill, her training to fight, cutting wood, moving heavy things. It all gave her a newfound strength and a new view of the world around her. She was not Taysha of 14 Winters any longer. Perhaps that girl had died. Back there. Somewhere in the mountains.

She looked at her arms. They weren't the arms of a little girl. They had lost their layer of fat, yet they looked bigger and stronger.

"Well, if I did die, I am still me," she said to her forearms, "so I will keep my name."

"What?" interrupted Bajesh, who seemed to have finished his conversation with the stars. Taysha looked over to him, trying to focus her mind. For a brief terrifying moment, she couldn't remember who he was. Then he smiled and her fear melted away. Only now she really, really had to sit down. Bajesh sat with her and they spent an eternity just staring at each other and then simultaneously broke into laughter. When the dreamlike state suddenly stopped, they realized they had no idea what they had been laughing at.

"What?" she asked him.

"No ... that's ... that's what I said!"

Taysha snorted and they both laughed again so hard Taysha almost peed herself.

"Oh. Pee. Pee," she said in Bajesh's language and staggered up on wobbly legs. Bajesh held out his arms as he laughed, protecting her from falling into the fire.

"Woooo," she said trying to verbalize what she was feeling when she stood up. She took a deep breath as she surveyed her surroundings.

" _Breath is life,"_ she reminded herself as she swayed lightly in the spiritual breeze that flowed around her. She suddenly stopped swaying and stood still with her head to the side as if trying to remember something.

"Pee!" Bajesh called out, loving the whole adventure.

"Pee!" replied Taysha excitedly as she clapped her hands and pointed to him. She lurched a few steps away from the fire before squatting with her back to Bajesh, and lifted up her tunic.

He could see the full shape of her buttocks and he lay over on his side to see if he could see her _snail_ , but the fire blocked his view. He sat up with a head-rush and the realization of what he had just done made him giggle.

"What funny?" Taysha called back over her shoulder.

"I ... uh. I don't know!" he called back. He let out a long breath and opened his eyes wide to help settle his mind. Taysha had finished peeing and returned to her log by the fire.

The whole experience had ended as quickly as it had begun and they sat in silence staring into the fire. Taysha tried to remember what seemed like a lifetime of memories that had fitted into that one moment between them. It felt like the longest time had passed but the fire was still burning high.

"Aiyaaaaa," she said out loud in a slow, low tone.

"Yeah," Bajesh agreed, "Aiya."

He looked up at her from the fire.

"Medicine of spirit and soul. To see what is hidden."

"Medicine," she repeated, still feeling as though her spirit was swinging from side to side.

Taysha felt the fire drawing her in again and she forced herself to break her gaze. She breathed out to keep from entering that World again so soon. Maybe another day. For now, it was bath time.

"Bath. We go," she said lazily.

"It's too early. It's not warm yet," Bajesh protested but Taysha had to move.

"No. Is good. Bath now!" She kicked her towel and soap closer to the pool and let her bear skin mantle fall to the ground. Bajesh sat and watched her pull her tunic over her head, enjoying the cannabis as it dissipated the embarrassment he would have felt otherwise. He sat comfortably watching her take off her loincloth and step into the bath.

Just as Bajesh had predicted, the water wasn't nearly hot enough. The moment Taysha got in she was out again, grabbing more stones from the fire. Every time she bent over to pick up another rock, Bajesh was seeing more than he thought he should be. Eventually it overpowered the cannabis and he averted his eyes. Yet he couldn't stop smiling at the girl throwing the white-hot rocks willy-nilly into the pool. Still floating along with the universe, he simply stood there smiling.

" Small space to sit now. How? We'll end up sitting on the rocks," he stumbled on awkwardly.

"You. Go," Taysha point for him to sit down first. He took off his pants and upper cloth, and checked to see that he wasn't erect, just in case Taysha looked.

She did. She couldn't help it.

Unfortunately, Bajesh didn't put on much of a show for her. He jumped into the water far too quickly in her opinion.

The mixture of sensations helped to clear his mind one moment, then confuse him the next.

"Cold, cold, cold. Hot, hot, hot. Cold here. Too hot here," he explained as he switched around to find a comfortable balance between the temperatures of the water and the air.

"No ... move!" She pointed for him to sit still. He let his head drop backwards to see her standing right behind him. He looked up to clearly see the folds of soft flesh peaking out from her pubic hair. He looked away as his cock sprang to attention and he tried to cover it by making ripples on the water.

It didn't help him much. Taysha stepped in beside him and simply sat on his lap.

Bajesh stopped breathing as she leaned back and pushed his cock against his stomach. She sat there ever so innocently as she moved the scattered rocks into the central pile. Bajesh thought there was no way she didn't notice what she was doing.

He was right. Taysha was well aware.

With the rocks safely in place and the heat circulating properly, she stood and turned to him, sitting back down with her crotch up against his member and rested her chin on his shoulder. She pulled her self in tight and held herself there.

Taysha sorted through a thousand thoughts as she felt Bajesh's heavy breathing match the rhythm of her own. She was sure about this. But only under one condition.

"I no want 'borakha,'" she whispered to Bajesh.

"I don't understand the word bora'ha," he whispered back.

"Borakha. Little man. Little woman. Waaa. Waaa," she imitated a baby crying.

"Yes. I understand. A baby. Waaa," he replied, though he questioned whether he was understanding her correctly. This time, even he had to laugh at his own stupidity. He was naked and had a naked girl sitting on his lap, facing towards him, telling him she didn't want a baby. Yes, he understood.

"Yes. I no want baby," she confirmed.

Taysha sat back slowly and Bajesh savoured the feeling of her soft nipples as they pulled back from his chest. She sat up on her knees and adjusted her stance. She took hold of his member and lowered herself down slowly.

The sensation felt embarrassing and exciting for Bajesh, and he started to shake. He could feel her guide the tip to her, her hair scratching the sensitive head.

He didn't flinch or complain. He let Taysha do as she pleased with him as he reached out slowly to take her breasts in his hands. The feeling of the soft weight was something new to him.

For Taysha, it sent small waves of pleasure that travelled from them to between her legs. She had always wondered why it was so desirable to have someone touch her there. To squeeze them, lick them. It seemed so silly to her. They were, after all, for feeding. But she could not deny the good feelings that swept over her when someone did.

The herb she had smoked earlier drew her in and out of her soul as she slowly moved back and forth. She felt him sucking and licking her breast and noticed he had stopped shaking. Her muscles from the day's work started hurting, so she moved more forcefully to reach the place of release.

"No baby," she reminded him.

The rush of pleasure for Bajesh would have made him release that instant had he not been sitting cross-legged in cool water. The new feelings were strange for him. At one moment there would be a surge of pleasure and then there were times in between when it would disappear.

Taysha rocked up and down, her head arching back, sometimes seemingly oblivious to Bajesh's presence. He sat watching her. It was an amazing experience to watch her both use him and yet give to him at the same time. At last, he was experiencing the joining of the souls of man and woman.

It was beautiful, and sacred, and good.

He could feel the familiar tingling sensation growing and he fought it off by trying to move or breathe differently. But Taysha's movements grew more aggressive and faster. In all honesty, it was becoming a little scary for him to witness it so close. It was a lot more intense than just sounds from across the hut in the dark. Eventually, the nervousness, the uncomfortable seating, the cold water, nor the mixed emotions could fend off the growing feeling any more. He grabbed her under her arms and pulled her up off him.

Taysha's eyes opened and stood over him, watching the white essence spout out from his cock and float like a little cloud in her bath. Bajesh arched his head back an instant and then let his head fall back down. He took a couple of breaths before reaching out, putting his arms around her bottom and pulling her close. There he sat, with his cheek in her pubic hair, not knowing what to think or do.

She leaned over and took her towel to keep her shoulders warm and she let him hold her there for a while.

" _First time, I'd guess,"_ she thought as she stoked his hair gently. _"I can't expect to be released with a boy on his first time."_

She stopped herself from sighing. She didn't want to hurt him. It wasn't his fault.

She smiled down at the top of his head as he sat there holding her.

"I'm cold," he said finally.

"Me too," she answered, "Let's go fire."

Taysha stepped out to stand by the fire and Bajesh stayed in the water, trying scoop the sticky stuff out of the pool. He gave up when most of it was gone and joined her. They stood facing the bathing fire, Amazoi style, with their towels held out across their backs, shivering, giggling and exchanging glances. Bajesh felt the life springing back into his member once more and tried to stop it by changing thoughts or by not looking at the beautiful girl standing naked next to him that he had just coupled with. But, it was no use and he turned and covered himself before it got too noticeable. His action was greeted with a stern rebuke from Taysha.

"No!" she said, "Is good," she added unmistakably pointing to his cock and then throwing up her arm in front of her imitating an erection. "Bambambaaa!" she made the sound of drums beating. "I Man! See me!" she growled in her lowest voice and stomped her feet. Bajesh laughed but didn't remove his towel. Taysha shrugged and shook her head.

She couldn't understand this tribe's such obvious embarrassment over their own bodies. Sure, they both look silly. Both man and woman have funny looking bits. And it is embarrassing. But it is the embarrassment that's fun. It's like watching a man stumble on the rocks with an armful of fish, or to hear the mixed words of a drunken speech, or when someone sneezed out snot, or farted or burped. It is our imperfections that unite us. But, that was how her people saw these things and they were no more.

\- - - - -
The events of that night brought the realization she now had a lover to add to the list of things that helped her live, yet hindered her from continuing to where she felt her people were waiting. In this bitter-sweet state of mind, she chose to keep with her plan to leave in the spring and to keep training hard in the meantime.

She remembered when Father and Anami had run up to the top of the mountain pass and back the first night they met. Taysha had decided, fitting with her goal to match the men in strength and ability, to do the same.

Bajesh returned the next day after chores to find her gone. The pups were tied up and had been fed. The bowls from breakfast still sat with dried food next to a well-stacked fire. Not finding her at the bath, nor answering his calls, Bajesh washed the bowls and played with the wolves while he patiently waited.

His father came by shortly after to finish the roof on her hut. Bajesh told him he did a quick search and could not find her. He started to get panicky but his father assured him there was no foul business. She had left with Bajesh's bow and arrows. If she had been attacked by men, then the knives, spear and most of the food would have been taken. Had it been an animal there would at least be a sign of a struggle. She obviously hadn't left for the West or she would have taken the food, copper pots and sleeping-furs. Father convinced him to be patient and they worked on finishing Taysha's hut.

The sound of someone walking on the field grass caught Bajesh's attention, and he stood eagerly to get a mild surprise.

It wasn't Taysha, but rather a girl from the village.

Her name was Ashritha. She was Bajesh's cousin on his mother's side and was a few years older than Bajesh. She was tall, smiled easy and was quick witted. Because she was old enough to remember carrying Bajesh when he was a baby, she tended to treat him like a little brother, something he didn't mind at all. She reminded him of a younger version of Mother.

"Hey!" she greeted them before Bajesh could react.

"Why ... what are you doing here?"

"Nice welcome, grub. Thanks a lot," she said as she walked straight over to the bushes dividing Taysha's camp.

"Around!" Bajesh yelled, "Go around. The entrance is over there!" he pointed.

A smile swept across Ashritha's face as she froze. She threw her hands up at Bajesh to calm him.

"All right! I was just looking... Geesh..."

"I invited her to help with the roof," Father explained.

Bajesh wobbled his head mutely. The disappointment that it hadn't been Taysha returning was obvious.

"Why?" Bajesh said without thinking.

"Nice welcome," Ashritha said sarcastically, giving him a light slap on the shoulder as she approached.

"She wanted to meet Taysha," Father stated. He then explained to Ashritha why Bajesh was being curt with her.

"Ah," she said and threw her head back in understanding, "That's too bad. I was looking forward to meeting her."

"You'll have your chance," Father said and clapped his hands together, "Well. The roof's not going to grow itself. Let's get that done, light a fire to dry it out, and she'll have a place to move into once the ground has dried."

"Good plan!" Ashritha agreed with an echoed clap.

"Don't worry, little cousin" she said to Bajesh.

Bajesh gave an unenthusiastic nod. Ashritha reached over and roughly pulled him close and shook him as if trying to shake the cheerful side back into place.

"Come oooon!" she coaxed, "She'll be all right. Don't worry. From what I hear of her she saved your skinny body from being eaten, no? She'll be fine."

The three finished Taysha's roof with the abundant supply of long dry grass from the field as thatch. They also cut and collected extra firewood to replace what they had taken from Taysha's stock of wood to use for the hut's fire.

There was still no sign of Taysha as the skies were quickly turning dark. Ashritha excused herself with a formal request to be brought to meet the girl properly by Bajesh. He promised. Father gave a few last tugs on the bindings of Taysha's roof. He then took his leave and walked back with his niece. Bajesh stayed to tend the hut fire and wait until Taysha came back.

And wait, he did.

Night continued and it was well into the dim light of morning before he heard a rustling outside the hut. He stepped out to see Father standing there, with extra twine and a large rolled up cloth under his arm.

This had been the fourth time that night that Bajesh had reacted to a sound that wasn't Taysha. He was too tired and worried to talk. Without a word to his father, he went back inside, threw an extra piece of wood onto the fire, and lay back down on his furs.

"Not back?" his father asked, showing his concern.

"NO!" Bajesh snapped, a little louder than intended.

"I wonder where she could be," Father said as he put the cloth and twine down inside the hut. Bajesh's only response was to put his chin on his hands as he stared out into the fire.

Father stood looking around as if to expect her to just walk out of the bushes.

"Have you tried the wolves?" he motioned to Bajesh.

"What? Whatdoyoumean?" he slurred, not bothering to lift his chin off his hands. He was annoyed at his Father's stupid questions to a situation that was obvious.

"The cubs here ... they could follow her. Track her."

Bajesh sat up with a surge of energy and stepped outside.

"Have you fed them?" Father continued as they walked over to the pups together.

"Yes, sometime during the night. They started whining."

"Oh dear," Father replied, "They're better if they're hungry. They'll know she had food for them. But let's give it a try."

Father untied their leashes and carried them to the field, where he plopped them down on the wet grass. They didn't seem to like the feeling of that too much. Since their time with Taysha they had kept to the drier, warmer area around the fire. The field was too open and big for them now and made them feel vulnerable. They stood, huddled together and rocked back and forth. Wada looked up at the man who had brought her out from the warmth, assuming he had brought them there for some reason. But, he just stood and barked down at them in human gibberish, so she turned and walked back to the fire. Ushi followed closely, with a quick stop along the way to pee on Taysha's new hut. The two men followed along until the wolves curled up at their place by the camp fire.

"No good. We'll wait until they're hungry. In the meantime, I'll scout around and see what I can find. Is there anywhere you didn't look?"

"A lot of places. I just figured she'd be back and all of a sudden it was dark, and I didn't..."

Bajesh started heaving in gulps of breath. His father was shocked to see his boy start to cry and stepped up to him and took him by the shoulders.

"Son, there are no signs of struggle or trouble. It is possible she went off somewhere and got lost and fell asleep for the night. But, we're in a bowl shaped valley with one exit. Give her some more time. She is stronger now than when she first came over the mountain to us that first day. And now ... she's armed."

He ended with a wink.

"Anami told me she sits on the south side of the Training Grounds to watch them every day. Why don't you start there?" he suggested.

"Yes, I thought of that but there was no training yesterday. And she knows when not to go," Bajesh answered.

"Perhaps, but it will clear our mind of questions. She could have fallen and hurt herself. It would be good to check."

His suggestion was interrupted by a snapping of a branch behind them. They turned to see Taysha hopping through the barren trees towards them with a big smile on her face, holding up two dead rabbits by the feet.

"Hello. Hello!" she called out to them.

Only Father replied.

Bajesh was less than amused at her happiness.

" _What's wrong with this girl? Trusts me to the point of sex and then disappears. No joke!"_

"Hello, hello," she repeated as she walked into the camp, straightaway crouching down to the pups, which jumped up and licked her hands in greeting. They were undeniably hers now.

She spoke to them in her native language as she dropped one of the rabbits for them to play with and fight over. She then stood up smiling to see Father's kind but solemn face and a very angry Bajesh. Father noticed the uncomfortable pause.

"I'll go finish up the hut," he said and left the two alone.

Taysha crouched down to see under the overhanging evergreen branches to get a better view of her new home.

"Oh. You finish!" She said happily when she saw the roof of the hut.

She started to follow Father out, but Bajesh grabbed her arm harshly and pulled her to him.

"Where were you?" he hissed through his teeth.

Taysha looked back, not knowing what was happening as the pain from her arm made her face contort in a mix of shock and anger.

"I go mou'n. Same as Father and Anami. Go. Back. One day. I am stronger," she explained as she pulled at his fingers with her free hand to lessen the pain.

"The mountain?" Bajesh confirmed, "I waited here all day and night for you."

The realization of what was happening hit her. She was being scolded. Scolded? Like a child? She didn't quite think it his place to do so. True enough, she hadn't told him she was going. Then again, it's not like she had to, damn him. She had sat at the campfire for more than a month when he was injured, never knowing if anyone would come or if they would come to kill her or chase her away. Or take back all the things they had brought her. Or rape her.

The first and only time she set out to do something on her own for more than a day and he stands there squeezing her arm. Damn him. The tears formed in her eyes as she pulled her arm out of his grip.

"Ouch," she said firmly. The cuteness of how she used his language softened Bajesh's anger and he felt sorry for her. But no words of compassion came from his lips. She should have told him she was going.

"Why didn't you tell me?" he asked.

"Tomorrow was rest day. Training. Today I want watch training." She looked up at the sky to get a feeling for the time.

" _Yesterday_ was a rest day," Bajesh corrected her softly.

Taysha ignored the instruction. "I go see hut."

Bajesh watched her go and talk to Father. Obviously the joy had left her. She stood purposefully holding her arm as if wanting Father to see what Bajesh had done.

"I didn't squeeze _that_ hard, you stupid child," Bajesh said quietly to himself and looked down at the cubs as he decided whether he should stay or go back to the village. He needed to sleep, that was for sure.

Taysha started helping Father apply the final waxed and oiled fabric to the roof. The roof was pointier at the top than the dome-shaped ones of her tribe. It felt larger inside than it looked from the outside. She already had a mental picture of where her bed would go. Taysha noticed Bajesh's sleeping-furs inside. He must have been the one keeping the fire going all night. The heat from the constantly tended fire and the moisture of the wet stones, grass and ground made it feel sweltering after her run.

" _Ah,"_ she noted to herself as she watched the smoke gather at the pointy roof, _"That's why the roof is high. It gathers the smoke better. Good thinking."_

Father came in and pointed out the thick cut pieces of wood that she could place around the inside of the hut for hanging clothes, weapons, spare furs, and what-have-yous. He was showing her how to attach shelves to the stone edge when they both heard Bajesh's footsteps stomp away. They stepped out to see him heading back to the village with a few of his things in hand.

"Bajesh!" his father called out, but the boy just quickened his pace until he disappeared into the woods.

"Ah, that boy." Father shook his head with a sigh at the spectacle and turned to Taysha who was just standing with pouting lips looking in the direction Bajesh had disappeared. Father sighed and drew Taysha's attention back to him.

"Do you like him?" he suddenly asked.

A day ago it wouldn't have been a difficult question to answer, now because of what happened that morning, she wasn't even sure herself. Father, thinking it more a problem of language, carried the conversation for them.

"Bajesh is a good boy but he thinks too much. He's like a woman," he added as he brought his head closer in showing it a secret jest between them.

"You must take care of him. Sometimes gentle. Sometimes strong. Do you understand?"

She felt she did. The emotions conflicted with those she had felt during her day and night of total freedom. To take care of someone was not something she wanted at the moment, especially someone who could fish and hunt and defend himself. She didn't have the time to take care of someone like she would have to a child.

She stood wondering if she truly liked this _girl-boy_ , stomping off into the woods like a child, or if it was just her body that craved a fucking. Regardless, she nodded her head _yes_ to Father, mainly because she wanted his worry soothed and she wanted to get some sleep and something to eat before watching that day's training.

"I sleep. I go see training," she said.

"Yes. Yes. Of course. I have a present for you when you come back. I'll leave it here in the hut."

"Present?" she asked.

"A gift."

"Gift?" she repeated, happily understanding that word.

"Yes. I hope you like it."

"I like it now. From Father. Of course I like," she smiled.

Father left, and Taysha went to her shelter to sleep, but the event with Bajesh continued to hound her. Of all the things, she focused on the grip Bajesh had on her arm, and how she couldn't get out of it. Next time, she would ask Anami what to do if she was grabbed like that again.

When the skies started to brighten, she finally gave up trying to sleep. She looked into Bajesh's shelter to see what he had taken back, and was relieved to find it was just his spear, heavy fur and some towels. A part of her missed him already.

A sudden brief connection between her fight with him and the realization of how much she depended on him and the others for food scared her. One bad argument like that and they could cut off her entire food supply. The wolf meat would last her a good while but not all winter. Not to mention smoked wolf meat was tough and not so tasty.

She looked over at the remains of the rabbit at the cubs' feet. They had hardly eaten any of it. Bajesh must have fed them. Once again she felt more annoyed at having her business interfered with. Fine with her if he didn't return. Little boy, too inexperienced to give her the satisfaction of physical release. She was better off to do it alone.

"Stupid boy," she said to the dead rabbit.

\- - - - -
"Idiot! Stupid girl!" Bajesh mumbled to himself all the way back to the village as if Taysha was running along behind him, overhearing how angry he was.

With every step he let the imaginary girl know all the things he had intended to say when she returned. How he missed her and how important she was to him. How he couldn't stand the thought of losing her.

But now, he couldn't convince himself to belong to a girl who wouldn't even think of telling him where she was going.

He may be young, but he had seen how some of the men and women of the village played such foolish games with their partners. Bajesh had promised himself long ago that he would not be one of those fools.

"That's it!" he declared, "I was wrong to have feelings for the girl. I see that. Tomorrow I go collect my things and bid the barbarian farewell."

He stormed into his family's hut, and quickly got a sharp rebuke from Brother for waking everyone up. Without a word of apology, Bajesh threw himself into his sleeping furs, and wrapped his blanket over his head.

"Your father went out to check on you and give Taysha her breastplate. Did you see him?" his mother asked from the darkness of the hut.

"Yeup," he answered curtly into his furs.

"Did she like her gift?"

"Dunno."

Mother picked up on the annoyance in his voice.

"I see," she replied and stopped talking.

Bajesh fell into much needed sleep and slept for the rest of the day. After hearing of his troubles from Father, the family spent most of their time outside until he awoke.

\- - - - -
Taysha stood at the entrance to her new home, admiring the finished project. She wasn't in any hurry to move in though. She had become comfortable the area in the woods. But, she had to admit, the furs and pine boughs couldn't keep the chill out that crept in from the sides and back of the shelter. Not to mention that having to re-stock it with fresh branches was becoming a bit of a chore.

It was pretty obvious the ring of rocks at the base of the hut would keep the heat in and the wind out all night. She felt the heavy bear fur that covered the wooden door. She was very touched to have received it. In her tribe, a full bear skin was a thing of value. It was usually cut up to make winter coats, like the one she had been wearing since her escape. She pulled open the door and crouched to step inside. The first thing her eyes went to was a colourful package of cloth that lay on the unfinished ground between her and the fire. She picked it up as she plopped herself down on Bajesh's sleeping furs to open it. Inside was thick, hard leather in two cup shapes about as wide as a man's hands, with straps that obviously meant to go around the back and fasten to the metal rings at the sides. Symbols that were unknown to her were imprinted along the bottom edge in a design.

"Armour!" she said, looking at the remaining piece in the wrapping. It was a type of loin-covering made with hardened leather on the front and back with fabric strips on the side. The front was recognisable because of the "V" cut which would enable her to run and kick easily. She smiled to herself as she held the pieces in the fire light. It would not aid her much in a battle unless, perhaps, her attacker was aiming for her breasts. But it seemed a good way to keep the shock of jumping or running from tearing at her. Until now, she had accepted the pain as part of her increase in strength but, in all honesty, she had doubts that breasts could be strengthened like muscle. She pulled off her tunic and placed the cold leather against her chest.

"Aiya!" she called out as she pulled it away she held it to the fire to warm it first. Then she remembered the two rabbit skins. She would put them in the cups to avoid that sensation again. Too bad she had let the wolves tear one of them to shreds.

"More rabbit. Need more rabbits."

The breastplate was a little too large and her boobs jiggled back and forth in them. She thought it would end up bothering her nipples rather than helping. But once they were lined with fur, it would pack everything in nicely and even make her breasts look bigger than they really were. So, she liked them.

She then changed into the loin-cloth bottoms.

" _This will save my pants if I train in this."_ she thought.

She grabbed her metal-tipped javelin and stepped outside. It was windy and cold but she didn't mind. She felt bold and powerful and she flexed the muscles on her arm. Looking up at the grey skies, she tried to imagine how she looked to the gods. If ever they came to her with more of their mischief, she would be ready. She danced around between the poles of her training ground, jumping lightly to test the armour while she held her breast piece close to her body.

"Yeah, I'm going to have to fill it with something. Ow ... hurts more than not having anything."

She did her bit of training and stayed in her armour all day. All the while, she expected Bajesh to show up. He finally came after dark, something she assumed he timed on purpose. What she wasn't expecting was for him to bring a woman.

Taysha stood there by her camp fire as he escorted the smiling young woman into her camp. She quite thought he had come to tell her go fuck a pig from now on. She realized how much she liked him when she felt the almost ecstatic relief to hear his escort was a cousin and she had just come by to meet her. Taysha told Ashritha her name meant "Red Leaf" in her language. Ashritha seemed very happy to hear that and they both got along well from the start. They spent the evening talking, eating and did a good deal of laughing. Even though Bajesh was still noticeably mad, he translated when he needed to by using simpler words that he knew Taysha understood.

At the end of the evening, Taysha was much relieved to hear him say he would come back after he had walked his cousin back safely. Though she didn't like him telling her she couldn't move into her hut yet because the ground hadn't dried properly. She didn't need him to tell her.

\- - - - -
Over the winter months, the lover's rift between them mended but their relationship had definitely changed. Both had grown up in their own ways. For Bajesh, he had learned it took more than a night of love to own the heart of a woman. It was clear to him she would never be the same girl who came wobbling into the village months earlier. He had to remind himself she was wild. She was a barbarian and he slowly made room in his heart to let her go.

To prepare himself for when she did leave, he spent more time in the village talking with another girl who he knew liked him. Though it was only simple conversations in open view, it helped him see he would be all right when Taysha left for the Dark Sea that spring. Even so, his main interest and time was spent with Taysha. That was, when she was there.

She had taken to hunting. As she wasn't invited or allowed to join the men from the village, she usually set off by herself. Ushi and Wada had grown large and tame enough to follow her at her pace and quickly caught on to the hunting game by flushing out rabbits invisible to Taysha's eye. She enjoyed the thrill of the hunt, the frustration of missing her shot and the re-tracking of her prey. She had to admit the snow gave her an advantage in tracking, but it was a good starting lesson.

Her arms were becoming solid and by late-winter they were bigger than Bajesh's, a fact he noticed during one of their love-making sessions. He realized why the women of his tribe stopped training at puberty.

" _Unsightly for a woman to have such muscle,"_ he thought but wisely kept is opinion to himself. He would possibly meet with a bleeding nose or cut lip if he grabbed her arm tightly now. He was sure she wouldn't really hit him but the thought had crossed his mind and he certainly wasn't going to test her on it. They had trained together a bit but it always led to arguments.

Even their communication had changed. Taysha was starting to speak the language of the Wedic to the point where Bajesh needn't correct her much any more. She had started offering him bits and pieces of her language, which he was quite uninterested in learning. Perhaps because he felt she was equally uninterested in teaching him. It was as though she was just saying the words to him, like an echo from a mountain, never taking the time to really teach him anything useful.

Even with such unspoken annoyances between them, they were still good friends and they spent more time laughing with and at each other than anything else. Bajesh had learned more about the art of physical love and Taysha was enjoying their times together.

Bajesh had brought a couple of his good friends over. They were soft spoken like Bajesh and shy; Taysha liked their company. She thought they might be the two young men that had come to watch her train topless a while back, but wasn't really sure.

The two of them and Ashritha seemed to have opened the way for others as well. Every now and then a new visitor would come with Bajesh, Father or Anami to meet her. Each of them would bring gifts of nuts or grains or dried fruits, eggs, cloths or leather pieces. So much was brought that winter that she had trouble storing it in her once empty hut. The path from the village to the Old Field was worn and wide. Even the snow didn't hide it for long.

On days she had been hunting, she would return to find cloth bundles of something or other at her door. She would take the contents and hang the cloth outside her hut for the owners to pick up later. Sometimes they were taken, most times they were not. It seemed she had accidentally started a hut design of tied cloth pieces. For the villagers who visited, it was a badge of honour to be the one to have the most cloths hanging from Taysha's hut.

She had also taken to decorating the inside and outside of her hut and the poles of her personal Training Grounds with symbols of her people. The first was a circle with a line drawn through it from top to bottom and two smaller circles drawn on each side of the line at the center. It was the symbol of life and earth. Beside it was her family mark of the bird, symbolizing a free spirit.

She had added an inner carpet behind her bear-skin covered door. The two pieces trapped the air in between, nicely keeping the creeping winds out. From every hunting trip she brought back as much moss as she could find and lined the inside of her hut with it. It was something which Father and the others who saw it thought to be a very good idea. A lot of the time her hut was too hot for her visitors in their winter clothes.

She kept a piss-pot by the door for her and her guests but no one apart from her ever used it. It saved her from bitter cold trips to the toilet in the middle of the night. The two wolves, who were kept on a leash tied to the outside, would sit just inside the door with her. They knew enough to go outside to relieve themselves or they would face the wrath of their mistress. She had learned, in turn, she could smack them with sticks and they would not attack her. It was a small thing but a comforting thought. She would sit and talk to them about her plans to make the trip to the Great Water. Even so, she had a certain distrust of them, especially after she had been woken with a start by one of them sniffing around her sleeping face. She hadn't the heart to turn them outside, so she just took to shortening their leashes every night before bed.

Even in the snow, the training area outside her hut was not neglected. She continued to remind herself that she must be as strong or stronger than a man before she journeyed westward for the last time.

The desire to go to the Great Water to die was not as strong as it had been at first but she put the growing ideas of other options behind her. She would think through all the choices once again when the flowers of spring had shown themselves.

Anami had come as often as he always had before but it was never enough for Taysha. She found she had started to like him dreadfully. She pictured herself being with him many times but she stayed focused on the most useful thing she could get from him: knowledge of the Martial Arts.

She was happiest when they sparred. There weren't any tiffs between them like with Bajesh. If Anami hit her hand or legs, he would just walk over and lean on a post and wait for her to shake out the pain, pick up her weapon and continue.

No apologies. No _"You should have done this or that."_

Anami had the attitude: _"If you don't like getting hit, quit or learn not to get hit."_

For Taysha, it was exactly what she needed.

Young Dinesh still came by occasionally. After seeing how many people were now visiting her, he no longer drifted away if someone was already there. He would now approach with a proper greeting.

Eventually Anami had him spar with her on his behalf. Taysha, who did not like the fact he had the same name as his cruel grandfather, called him Dinesha, which was the equivalent of calling him Little Dinesh in her language. Though it was more a feminine version of his name, he didn't know and he seemed not to mind, so she didn't bother explaining.

He was surprisingly strong, which only encouraged Taysha to train harder. There was no doubt she herself was becoming stronger than any female she had ever known. But having troubles wrestling a young boy to the ground showed her how much farther she had to go.

Bajesh would come and go whether there were people there or not. It was the general understanding in the tribe that he and Taysha were together. No questions were asked but it was the hot topic behind the family's back. Mother wasn't stupid, of course, and knew as soon as she left each group they would start to talk, just as she did to others. She herself wondered what was going to happen between the two of them.

Taysha and Bajesh's open show of an argument one day told Bajesh's parents more about the seriousness of their relationship than if they had been caught naked together. Mother and Father had talked about how much they should intervene and the consequences that could occur. Their conclusion was that was it was in the hands of the gods. They had taught their sons well. And if Taysha was chosen for some great destiny beyond their comprehension, they would be proud of Bajesh's chosen role in her story.

Bajesh himself had grown accustomed to the new rhythm of having a partner. Although not a normal relationship by his tribe's standards, it was hardly expected that Taysha would behave according to Wedic custom.

Sometimes he would go hunting with her. Otherwise she would point in a direction she would be heading in, tell him the maximum of days she'd be gone, and go by herself. He wondered if she had another hut somewhere where she met someone from the village. His worst fear was his brother. Brother had been uncharacteristically uninterested in Taysha all this time. It seemed like a ruse. But Bajesh had done some scouting around a reasonable distance in every direction from her camp and had seen no sign of a common trail.

His nervousness had also been fuelled by his realization that his feelings toward the Wedic girl in the village had grown. He had spent more time talking to her the last two months than in his entire life. She seemed to be always near where he did his daily duties: cutting wood, washing and hanging clothes, skinning and preparing the meat when animals were brought in. There was also the tending of their five geese in the communal pen, collecting eggs, mending nets, taking turn at night watch to stoke the village fire. Other chores were clearing puddles by filling holes, roof repairs, shoe repairs, bringing this and that to grandmother's friends for her. And, of course, there were always the obligatory visits to relatives and the other families.

He was even spending all his nights with Taysha now, coming back in the morning to do chores as Taysha went off to lift rocks or climb trees, or whatever it was she did when he wasn't around. For the most part, he now reminded himself of his brother, with one girl in the woods and another in the village wanting him.

Back with his people, the older boys would ask and tease him what it was like to _"be with her."_ He smiled and told them to mind their own business or he'd send her back to beat them black and blue. It was during one of these banters one day that Bajesh said how she could probably beat anyone near her age in the village.

This didn't go well when one of Anami's disciples overheard it and took it as a bragging challenge rather than a joke. The young man's name was Adit and he was constantly trying to maintain and improve his position as the possible next Master-of-Arms to the son-less Anami.

Bajesh sat there and looked up at him in sheer disbelief as Adit openly challenged Bajesh to prove his claim.

"What? Go away. I didn't say I would. She's the one with arms as big as yours. Go challenge _her._ "

Bajesh didn't think about how he had answered, so much as just saying anything to get Adit to leave.

"What a cock-head," Bajesh mumbled under his breath to his remaining friends and forgot about the matter completely.

\- - - - -
The snow fluttered down lightly the next day as Bajesh was walking towards Taysha's camp. He was out of sight of the village when he noticed he was being followed. Thinking it either his father or Anami, he was surprised to see Adit and a small group of boys and girls, ranging from children to young adults, following behind.

"I'm challenging her!" Adit called to him.

"What? Don't be stupid. She's just a girl," he called back.

"Stupid? Do you want to call me that again?" he barked as he strode towards Bajesh.

"No," Bajesh mumbled back.

"Bring me to this girl then. I'll ask her myself."

Bajesh's mind raced to find the answer to this sudden problem as the distance to Taysha's camp lessened.

"All I was saying was that I think she's very strong. There's no girl _that_ strong. She's only been training five mon..."

He was cut off by Adit grabbing his winter cloak and pulling him closer.

"Let the girl speak for herself. This started because you were speaking for her. It doesn't make any sense for you to keep talking then, does it?"

It wasn't really a question. Bajesh looked at the group behind Adit. They were obviously anticipating the whole show. Adit would need to settle this to the barbarian girl's face or disappoint the few idiots behind him.

"Let's go," Adit commanded as he pushed Bajesh backwards in the direction of the Old Field.

Bajesh turned and slowly started walking, hoping Father or better yet, Anami, was already there. Or that maybe she had gone hunting again without telling him. Ironically, it would have made him happy this time. But they passed the final tree to see her practising with her spear in the Training Grounds. She wore only her winter pants and was topless, her body steaming in the falling snow. She was an impressive sight, for sure. Her lean body had filled out on the shoulders and arms as her back cut to her waist like a branching tree.

Taysha stopped and stood breathing heavily at the sight of the large crowd at the borders of her land. She placed the rear end of the spear on the ground and held it with her left hand as she rested her right on her hips.

She recognized one of the older ones that stood beside Bajesh as Anami's pupil. He was the one that taught in more of a persistent manner – the one she didn't know but didn't really like. The young man stood wide-eyed at the sight of her near nakedness.

Taysha sighed at his blatantly childish behaviour and reached over with her right hand to hold her spear and cover herself nonchalantly with her arm. As she did so, the trance seemed to break immediately.

" _Moon stares."_ she told herself, _"This village is full of them. Are they not permitted to see breasts at all? How do the young eat?"_

Bajesh noticed Adit's hesitation and surprise, and not for the first time in his life, he wished he was the stronger man. For if he was, he would have stood laughing at the top of his voice as he pointed to the stupid look on Adit's face.

Taysha stood waiting for the explanation of their sudden assembly when Adit collected his wits and pushed Bajesh towards her. The sudden push and the look on Bajesh's face as he covered the ground between them told Taysha all she needed to know about the situation. She stood still with her head resting on the staff of her spear as she lazily looked at Adit to show her disinterest and contempt. Bajesh approached her and explained.

As he did, Adit surveyed Taysha's personal training ground, and looked rather envious.

Bajesh now wished he had taken time to learn more of her language so they could have spoken secretly in front of everyone.

"Hey now!" Adit shouted over to them, "Does she understand? Will she admit her inferiority to me?"

"...her inferiority to me?" Bajesh repeated it just loud enough for Taysha to hear, "What an ass hole full of shit, this guy." Bajesh sighed and stood looking at the mild interest on Taysha's face. He yelled over his shoulder to Adit, "I have to explain some words she doesn't understand. This will take some time."

Adit wasn't the patient type. He started marching across the training grounds to them. The instant he saw the barbarian girl slowly change the grip on her spear and pull her right leg back in a fighting stance, he stopped.

Even so, with his level of confidence, it didn't faze him as much as Taysha would have hoped. He looked quite ready to defend himself if needed. Still, common sense had him stay just outside striking distance.

"Tell her," he said to Bajesh as he looked into her eyes, "Fight me or admit me stronger."

" _Fait_ means 'fight?'" she confirmed with Bajesh, using her hand in a gesture for punching. Bajesh nodded.

"Why?" she asked with a half laugh of disbelief, making Adit clench his jaw at the arrogant wench.

"Uh..." Bajesh started then stopped to think, "You stronger? He stronger? He wants to know."

Taysha's eyes met with Adit's gaze then looked him up and down in a subtly disrespectful way.

"You no staff or spear. " she said bluntly to his face.

Adit was working out what she had said, or was trying to say, as Bajesh looked back at him in disbelief.

"Adit ... she's a girl. What's wrong with you?" he blurted out. But it was evident his part in the situation was over. It was now a direct conflict between the two of them.

"No weapons," Adit replied to Taysha, "Hands and feet. Hands and feet, you understand that?" Adit threw his chin up arrogantly at Taysha.

"I un'erstand." she said slowly, "I not stupid. You un'erstand that?" she played at him loud enough to get a couple of snickers from his crowd.

Adit took a couple steps forward.

"Tell her to put some clothes on. I can't fight her like that."

Taysha understood and before Bajesh could open his mouth she snarled back:

"You take clothes _off_. Are you scared? You are baby? With baby cock?"

She followed the harsh insult with a mocking baby cry.

Bajesh was petrified. He had never, ever heard anyone talk to Adit or any of the elder, stronger men that way. Even wives at their angriest moments had better sense than that.

In a flash, the red-faced Adit made a grab for her arm before she could position her spear. But Taysha did not co-operate with the plan. She released her grip and pulled her right arm back and out of the way.

Adit made a simple mistake by continuing forward in his attempt to grab it. Taysha instinctively held her spear firmly between them with her left arm as she struck at his nose with her right, just as Anami had taught her. She caught him on the side of his nose with the edge of her open hand. The pain shot right into Adit's eyes, making them water immediately. But he kept his body moving forward as his attempt to grab her arm had changed into a swing at the side of Taysha's head with a closed fist.

The strike landed, and made her take a couple of steps back. For a confusing instant, Taysha had thought the unseen blow had come from someone who had crept up behind her. From the corner of her eye she looked at Bajesh's face to see what she could read from it. It didn't indicate that kind of treachery had occurred. He was looking at her with a feeling of pity and despair. No, the blow had come from Adit somehow. She had been too focused on watching the results of her first strike to see his counter-attack.

Thankfully, Adit took the opportunity of the disengagement to step away to a safer distance while squeezing the tears from his eyes. Taysha looked at him, then to her spear that lay on the ground between them. Perhaps foolishly, perhaps out of fear, she went to pick it up. It was then Adit kicked.

This time she could see it coming.

It had surprised her how he moved with such precision even through his pain. His skill obviously exceeded hers and his front kick sprung out at her like a crouched wolf. She had enough footing to try to jump back out of the way but his foot caught her ribs in mid flight and sent her backwards, falling onto the dirty snow.

That was the end of that. Or so Adit thought.

The barbarian fell back and rolled out of his range with apparent ease. Anami had been teaching her. That was for certain. Adit just hadn't realized to what degree.

Five months of training and she had already avoided his grab, hit him in the nose and partially evaded his kick after being knocked up-side the head.

He stood for a moment on the spot where he had expected Taysha to fall.

It was where Adit would have dropped his knee on her neck and pinned her under his weight to force her to give up. But she stood hunched over just out of reach of fist and foot.

The group cheered neutrally for both of them. For the Wedic, it wasn't a matter of taking sides as it was enjoying a well-executed fight. Already it had been a far better show of bravado and skill than any of them had imagined.

Although having partially leapt out of the way, Taysha felt as if she had received the full force of his kick. She understood very clearly now what Anami had been saying when he explained the difference between pushing and striking. A push will push, a strike will cripple. And crippled is what she felt like. The pain shot through her every time she tried to inhale deeply. She stood there, not knowing what to do next.

Yet through the pain, fear and confusion she found herself thinking, _"Is this it? Is this a fight?"_ In her tribe, it usually consisted of the men wrestling on the ground until one of them hit their head on a rock or they just tired out or the others, tired of watching them, came to pull them apart.

She wasn't sure what the protocol was for the Wedic. But continue or finish, she would be ready either way and she straightened up to show her defiance.

"Ah shits," Adit said. The comment was directed more towards giving up trying to stop the tears rather than at Taysha's will to keep fighting. He walked straight towards her with hands at the ready, blinking as he came.

Taysha instinctively retreated but remembered Anami's instructions of Retreat to Attack and Retreat to the Side, both of which were part of the 63 Steps of the Spear that she had learned from Dinesh.

She tried to use a retreat-and-lunge but her movement was too animated and predictable. Though Adit avoided her attack effortlessly, she was pleased to find it startled him enough to stop his advance, if even for a moment.

" _He's cautious,"_ she told herself, _"That means he fears me."_

She hopped back with the purpose of leaping forward with a kick, but she had moved too far backwards and her kick landed short of Adit. Taysha stood still for a moment thinking what to do next when Adit rushed in, taking her off guard.

Her only reply to his attack was another attempt at a palm strike to the nose but Adit's sudden rush coming straight at her made her curl up her body and close her eyes. She grazed him on the top of the head as he grabbed hold around her waist, picked her up and slammed her to the ground.

In practice, she had learned to fall and to roll. But in practice she was never picked up and thrown straight down. She landed so hard it knocked the air out of her lungs and she hit the back of her head on the hard mud. She tried to turn and hold her head but Adit was soon down beside her with one knee on her stomach, crushing her just below her ribcage.

"Get off me, maggot cock!" she choked out in her own language as the pain in her head was now replaced by the fear of not being able to breathe. She saw him reach down to grab her arms and she flailed them about in resistance. The fight was close to over. Taysha was already at the end of her endurance and just wanted to lie quietly when she heard Bajesh yell.

"Go! Get out ... out under his knee ... Fight!"

She heard the others in the group shouting instructions on how to get out of his hold. Though she didn't understand all the words, what it did tell her was they believed the fight was not over yet. They believed she could continue.

She also noticed Adit was having a terrible time trying to grab both her arms through his clouded vision. A surge of confidence and defiance swept over her through her gasps for air.

She placed her free hand on the side of his knee and pushed down to slide out from underneath him.

Adit, so focused on grabbing her last flailing arm and ending the fight, forgot about his legs. The unexpected move made him put his hands out to stop himself from falling forward onto his chest. Taysha was already on one knee, feeling grateful to be out from under the pressure of the stupid boy.

"NOW!" screamed Bajesh "Jump on him. Jump on him!"

The idea was great but the alarm signalled Adit's reflexes into action. Taysha started to leap at him but the inability to catch her breath slowed her movement and Adit had unexpectedly rolled to the side. She landed on her hands where his head and upper body should have been.

Adit spun on his back and kicked at her arms to bring her down once more, but apart from the fresh bruise she would have the next morning, it accomplished little more than making her grimace. He could have kicked her head but in the moment he had decided it an unmanly thing to do. He would have to beat her fairly to keep the respect of everyone watching.

Taysha fell back and regained her balance as they both scrambled to their feet. Adit seized his chance the moment he saw her stand up straight. He lunged at her again with his shoulder and wrapped his arms around her tight as he used his body's momentum to tackle her and bring her to the ground. She had better luck keeping her head from striking the ground this time but the pressure of Adit's shoulder and the impact was too much to bear.

"Stop!" she cried with the precious breath she had left.

"STOOooooP!" yelled Bajesh as he held his hand up in the air to indicate the end of battle. He slid into the mud beside them and pushed Adit off her.

"Are you all right?"

"Can't ... breathing ... No good. Ow. Ow, ow, ow..."

Under any other circumstances she would have sounded comical but Bajesh just knelt there in the mud watching her with concern etched on his face. The group of boys and girls had cheered and rushed over to help their senior clean off the mud and snow. Taysha used Bajesh's body to pull herself to her feet and she walked in short circles trying to catch her breath, just wanting them all to leave. She suddenly felt jostled and pulled by a few hands and she thought the worst was happening.

She turned to see the children pulling her back towards the group, smiling and saying things she didn't understand but were quite clearly positive.

They brought her to Adit, who, through teary eyes was wiping some of the larger pieces of snow and mud from his front as his entourage helped from behind. Bajesh grabbed her right hand gently and held it up towards Adit. She wasn't too happy but allowed him to do it. She looked up at Adit who held his hand out also and lightly gripped hers. It felt funny to have her hand gently held by a man she thought was trying to kill her just moments ago. She felt her face go red, and she shyly grabbed hold of her outstretched arm to cover her breasts.

Bajesh rattled off a lot of things beside her as he stood keeping her hand in Adit's. She didn't catch most of it, but it sounded like some sort of ceremony.

Bajesh knew she didn't understand and took a moment to explain, "Our custom. It's good. We all lose. We all win. We lose and we become stronger. Ask Anami. He will tell you."

Bajesh then repeated the words he had just spoken. It became obvious to her he was wanting her to repeat them. She could feel her hand starting to sweat. She occasionally had to grit her teeth against her pride as she followed Bajesh's words. Especially when she understood she was calling Adit the Victor. But the mood all around her was cheerful, with smiles and patient waiting as she hacked her way through their customary speech of acknowledged defeat. And although she didn't want to show it, the pain was subsiding and the breathing was becoming easier. When she had finished, Bajesh let go of her hand and she let it slip out of Adit's grip. In that moment, their eyes met and Taysha spoke directly to him.

"What is this? I say now?" she directed to Adit.

"The name of what you said to me?" he asked.

"Yes. This," she replied.

"It's the Acknowledgment of Defeat."

"Ak'nogelmet of defet," she tried to repeat, "Next time ... Next time you ... say this to me."

A smile crept across Adit's face in spite of himself.

"Very good," he said. "In spring then. We fight again."

"Spring. Yes," she agreed, still hunched over.

Amongst the hustle and bustle of his admirers, Adit turned to leave. At the end of the field he turned back to see Bajesh putting his winter coat over her shoulders.

"You have great tits!" he yelled back with the gesture of gently holding his own invisible breasts. This was followed by a chorus of laughter from the others.

"IN THE SPRING!" he shouted over his shoulder as they walked out of sight. Taysha had no retort to give. She stood, with the words lodged in her throat as she watched them leave.

\- - - - -
Later that day, as Taysha and Bajesh sat in her hut, they heard footsteps in the snow and a rap on the bearskin door.

"Hellooo?" came a man's voice from outside. The voice was followed by Anami's head as he poked it through the door.

"Are you naked?" he added jokingly and pushed his way inside without waiting for a reply. She was still just wearing Bajesh's coat over her shoulders, but it was more than nothing.

Anami had a big smile on his face and was soon followed by Father. Outside stood a couple of their friends that Taysha recognized as her supporters. Father and Anami were so used to her topless appearance they didn't think twice when they entered. That was until they noticed their two friends remained outside after the first one stuck his head in and saw her.

"It's all right," Father called back to them laughing. "She's always like this, you'll get used to it."

Taysha shot an inquiring glance at Anami, who pointed to the slight opening in the coat. She looked down and gave an understanding shake of her head in dismay as she tapped her finger to her head showing they were crazy.

One of the two fellows entering said quite seriously, "Just don't tell my wife."

They had brought the customary gifts when paying a social visit. This time the snacks were accompanied by alcohol and cannabis that the four men had obviously been partaking of earlier.

They had heard of the fight from the others at the village and had come to hear Taysha's side of the story, though her limited vocabulary meant Bajesh would tell it for her.

Taysha felt honoured as the young man went through the whole fight in energetic detail:

Taysha's eluding the initial grab and landing a strike on one of Anami's top students in her first blow. Her jumping back in the air to absorb the kick (at which she lifted up the coat to show the bruise). Her escape from underneath Adit and the closeness of her gaining the upper hand. And finally her obvious mistake of standing straight up and enabling herself to be so easily tackled.

The way Bajesh described it made her realize why she was hurting so much. Bajesh had used his hands to "lift" Taysha high into the air and landed her on the ground with a thud.

The story was met throughout with "Ooohs" and "Ahhhs" and claps of approval from the men. At the end, they all applauded Taysha's efforts.

She couldn't hide her smile. It seemed to stretch so far it brought tears to the corner of her eyes. She stopped herself from crying by showing the bump on the side of her head and acting as if trying to stop it from reeling around.

"Ah, No worry," replied Anami with a light swipe at the air towards her, "You should see Adit! He looks like a bear. All black in his eyes. Beaten up by a girl..."

So the compliments started and soon they were sitting comfortably as they drank, smoked, laughed and enjoyed each other's company until the host showed signs of weariness.

"Well, I'd better head back," one of the men said as he pulled on his fur coat, "Good fight, young woman."

He nodded to her respectfully as the rest of them started to follow his lead and pack up. Anami was the last to leave. He hesitated at the door and turned back to her with a smile.

"We'll have to work harder for your fight in the spring."

"Thank you," she said simply yet wholeheartedly.

As the men's singing got fainter in the distance, she looked over at Bajesh collecting the tea bowls with one hand while fastening the latch on the door with the other.

"Let's couple," she said.

"Eh?" He looked back at her, surprised.

"You're not sore all over?"

"I always sore all over," she smiled, "But you above tonight."

"Above?" Bajesh questioned as he put the bowls down and started to crawl over to her, "I think you mean, I'm on top tonight."

Taysha didn't answer.

She just softly fell back into her furs and smiled

\- - - - -
True to his word, Anami came the next day to train Taysha.

It had become obvious to Anami that Adit had need of experience fighting someone who was determined to beat him. This had not been the case in recent years since none of the Wedic questioned Adit's probable future position as the Master-of-Arms. Even Anami had become unconcerned about deciding who would be his successor. And this relaxed behaviour angered him greatly.

The fight between Taysha and Adit seemed to have re-enforced Anami's thinking that the whole tribe was becoming weaker in the safety of their tranquil, hidden valley. It was clear to him that it was time to train them as if they were the warriors his people had once been. And he would start by embarrassing the tribe with Taysha's ability to man-handle one of their better fighters.

Anami felt in all probability, Adit would win again. But Taysha didn't think so, and that was all he needed to work with.

He started by working on what Taysha had truly lost to: her breath and her inability to continue through the pain. He had learned long ago that every skill in the world is rendered useless when one is out of breath. Then even the greatest of men can easily be beaten.

Anami knew exactly what to start with on her first day. He would run her up and down from her camp to the mountain pass she had first come from. He would then train her while her legs and lungs still burned to increase her strength. Bear Walks, Wolf Runs and Wolf Leaps, Frog Jumps, Goose Runs, Bird Hops, Lizard Crawls and lifting her own weight on that well-worn branch near her old shelter. And he would continue to do so every day until she matched him as an equal.

He quickly discovered that Adit wasn't the only one to have underestimated her will. His original mental image of him having to stop from time to time for her to catch up was replaced by the reality of having to force himself to keep ahead of her. She had kept by his heels through the jog, the run, the climb and the final crawl through the snow to the top. Anami had his hands at his sides, breathing heavily into the cold air, when Taysha joined him at the highest point of the pass.

She started to squat down to rest but Anami, who had worked his way through pain and discomfort before, prompted her to stand and start back down the mountain right away.

"Do as I do!" he called back to her, inventing a new training method on the run. He would run straight for a solid tree, jump at it and then propel himself off the sides; bounding from tree to tree like a squirrel. Sometimes he would use his legs, sometimes his arms.

" Don't push to move the tree. Push to move yourself!"

Anami was quite honestly having a bit of fun. But, it took a lot of strength not to show how exhausted he was by the time they reached her training circle. Taysha sat down on one of the snow-covered logs, only to be scolded once again by the still standing Anami. They walked around in the circle with their hands on their hips, while Taysha copied Anami's controlled breathing.

"You need to be aware of your breathing," he emphasised by taking a deep breath through his nose and exhaling through his mouth, "Always moving. Always breathing."

He straightened his back, "One mouthful of water. Then to the Pull Up Tree."

He waved Taysha towards her hut and back into her old camp and the branch she had stripped the bark off that autumn. Anami stood beside her as she did six pull-ups easily enough. She struggled through her seventh and when it looked as though she would drop to the ground he grabbed her legs before she could let go.

"More," he said simply as he lifted and dropped her in unison with her pulling herself up. He gave just enough help for her to continue.

"Fifteeeen. Six ... teeeen," he counted, "Good," he praised her as he let her down.

Taysha felt her pumped arms and she smiled.

"Yes," Anami said, "they fill with strength. We'll make you strong, girl. Don't worry about that. Now, follow me."

Back at her Training Grounds, he led her through the Free Hand Steps: 48 movements using all four limbs with the purpose of slowly stretching every muscle the Wedic knew of.

Taysha was surprised it didn't ease her breathing. In fact she felt it to be as much work as any of the strenuous moves. Every time she tried to lessen the strain, Anami would scold her and make her do it again.

She was learning to adjust her breathing to match her movements, rather than adjust her movements go match her breathing.

Eventually she got through them and she was permitted another mouthful of water. Her arms now stretched, Anami led her back to the Hanging Tree.

"Again," he said and she jumped up to the branch.

She did six pull-ups easily, and three with a bit of difficulty but this time she cleared sixteen with Anami's help and finished at twenty-two.

Her arms were once again swollen with budding strength and he led her through the 48 Steps once again. The two continued this pattern until Taysha couldn't do a single pull-up on her own.

"Good. Good," he patted her on the head as she crouched holding her drum-tight, and quite useless, limbs.

"One more easy walk through the Free Hand Steps then you are done for today. I'll come back tomorrow. Eat and sleep. Sleep is good for you now."

She followed along the Steps that she could do mostly without error now. Her arms felt like dead dogs hanging at her side but she carried through to the end and Anami took his leave.

Taysha stumbled back to her hut, feeling a bit sick. Looking up at the darkening grey skies over the mountain peaks, she couldn't believe it was still the same day they did the run.

" _There and back in one day,"_ she chortled with a feeling of accomplishment before she ducked into her home.

All she had strength for was to stoke the fire, lie back on her furs, and fall asleep.

\- - - - -
For the next two months Anami came for five days, then let her rest for a day, then came back for five days. They would warm up at her training ground with the 48 Steps. Some mornings the thought that Anami would take her up to the top of the pass yet again almost devastated her. Had Anami allowed it, she would have whined and cried and crawled back into the warm furs. But she knew better. A man of Anami's stature would not put up with it. She would either be feminine or masculine with him. Not both. He had come to train her as a warrior and she knew to act accordingly.

She also learned that the overwhelming soreness throughout her body slowly dissipated over the course of warming up and left her completely by the time she had returned from the climb. Just as when she had first started training by herself, her body became accustomed to the new level of work and strain. And one cold, sunny morning the intense pain was there no longer.

Anami was looking leaner too. She remembered her first run with him and how she kept up with him well enough. Now it seemed it was he who was getting stronger and she who was not changing. Five solid days of running up the mountain was madness, to be sure, especially that last push through the snow at the top of the pass.

Anami had been focusing on hand-to-hand combat skills for her. She lost every practice fight she had with him. He gave her no pity. Taysha could see how superior he was, and she questioned whether she could beat one who studied under him.

She confronted these thoughts one night as she lay with Bajesh sound asleep beside her. If she really thought it still impossible to beat Adit, then why should she continue? She was, after all, a girl. A woman. A wolf can't fly, no matter how hard it trains. Nor can a fish hunt on land, no matter how much it wants to. Were women and men as different as that?

She pulled her arm out from under the fur blanket and held it next to Bajesh's and compared them in the glow of the fire. She could beat Bajesh, she thought. And if she could beat him after four months of training, she could beat Adit after seven.

\- - - - -
That last month of winter had been busy for everyone. Bajesh had been helping Taysha out whenever he could. His main task seemed to be regularly rubbing down her body with the ointment for her muscles. Because Taysha had no time or energy to hunt, he had been making dinner from the food that he, his father or mother had taken to her. Anami brought a fresh egg for her every morning for her breakfast. He had to sneak them out, as there would be much ado over the barbarian girl constantly getting free eggs, especially during the winter months.

One small group of children would sneak around to spy on Taysha and bring back information to Adit on what she had done that day. Adit hadn't commissioned them to do so, yet he humoured them all and rewarded their loyalty by showing them kindness and great respect for their attempts to help. He was confident enough the girl couldn't learn enough in three months to actually beat him.

Everyone in the Wedic village knew of the upcoming fight of honour and in contrast to their peaceful political society, it was a rare and much anticipated event. Bets were originally set up by the men but no one bet on the girl. One man raised the odds higher and higher and finally cancelled at the thought of her actually winning by chance. No one really thought she could win. Even though she almost broke Adit's nose once, it was just a matter of common sense to them.

Was she strong? Yes. Was she stronger than Adit? No. Skilled and motivated? Most definitely. Better skilled in comparison to Adit's years of training? Highly unlikely. Speed would be comparable but hardly in an advantage for her. Adit also had the advantage of height, weight and of longer arms and legs.

Anami's daily attention to her training would make for a good fight nonetheless. Even if they just rolled around on the ground together for a while, it would be worth watching. They doubted Adit would finish the fight with strikes. After all, she was a girl.

Adit saw it differently. He knew the grab he made for her in the first confrontation was sloppy and embarrassing.

The Wedic say, "Underestimating your enemy is his strongest weapon against you."
And it was this phrase that now constantly repeated in his head. Though it was because of the pain and his inability to see clearly that made the fight drag on so long, it was still an embarrassment to him. The next time he would end the fight quickly. His entire fight plan consisted of a straight, low strike with his fist to the girl's sternum.

He had seen it done before. He had done it before. And it had been done to him. He could attest to its simplicity and effectiveness. He would just aim between and below her perfect tits. Boom. If she avoided the blow, she would have begun the motion that he only need follow.

He refrained from entertaining the thought of hitting her in the nose, as the whole tribe would be there watching and he was still unmarried. It would be nice to finish this sanctioned fight against a girl and not lose the respect of every female in the village in the process.

From Anami's point of view, Taysha's training focused more on the past fight, rather than the future one. He had gone over it with her move for move and had taken her through the seemingly endless variations of each action until he was certain she would have won that fight if she was able to do it again. Anami's outlook was that if she was to lose, at least it would not be from making the same mistakes.

On a particularly hard day of sparring, Anami could see Taysha's spirit breaking. He sat her by her outdoor fire beside the Training Grounds, and with great care and patience shared the wisdom of generations of the Wedic training in war;

"A man of great skill and power, with no desire to fight, will lose to the simplest untrained fool. Fighting is as much about the Mind as it is the Body. Show Adit no fear, and he will think you fearless. Refuse to stop, and he will think you unstoppable. And when he does ... and only then... is when you have begun to win. His eyes will show you when that time is..."

\- - - - -

Early one morning Taysha stepped out of her hut to go pee before Anami arrived, when she noticed a little flower poking out of the snow in front of her.

" _Oh no,"_ she thought, _"Spring already..._ "

She instantly had an uneasy feeling in her stomach. Her first thought was that she should be more concentrated on preparing to get to the Great Water than having some boy-ish fight over pride. She ended up telling herself she was doing what needed to be done. The time it would take to fight Adit wasn't so much and she had more than likely missed the spirits of those who had been killed in the Hoorg attack. Besides, she would need to know if she could stand a chance against having to fight a man. This fight would let her know if she was ready. Fine enough, but it still didn't calm her stomach.

Taysha stood outside chewing on the last piece of her smoked wolf meat when Anami showed up. She pointed to the first flower as he walked by it.

"Ah." He understood the connection with it and her worried look, "Not to worry. We'll probably wait until the snow melts. In our language, the "First Flower of Spring" doesn't literally mean when the first flower is seen. We still have some time. Don't worry. Besides, you'll need six days of rest before the fight in order to heal. Mind and Body."

But the preparations had undeniably begun. Anami put more emphasis on slower movements and stretching to avoid injury. People would come by during training to ask Anami where this or that should go or to quell some argument over seating arrangements. Some brought cloth pieces on poles with shapes of animals sewn on them, asking Taysha which one she liked. Not really knowing what they were all about, she chose a white cloth with the pattern of a buck in black and gold.

As more sunny days filled the skies and the snows melted with surprising speed, the more relaxed the training became. Taysha focused less on strength and more on mentally going over each move and counter-move she had learned. A lot of time was just spent on breathing and stretching.

Bajesh's mother extended her visits past merely delivering food so she could go over finer details of Taysha's _entrance_. This "entrance" that everyone was talking about wasn't very clear in Taysha's mind.

She thought it was some sort of Wedic habit and just decided to leave it to Mother to organise. Taysha would find out exactly what it was soon enough, though she couldn't help thinking it all felt more like a wedding than a fight.

Apparently, it was a new type of ceremony for the Wedic as well. It was mixed with old customs for warriors before battle and new ideas to match the unique situation. A lot of the older ones found it blasphemous and against the usual customs. But there was such a buzz of excitement during the organisation of the event, their objections were easily ignored. Even the Council saw it was unwise to try to stop everyone.

Mother cleverly took advantage of their powerless situation and arranged it so that Taysha would march proudly straight through the village from the east end to the Training Grounds on the west side. She knew it would be a show of defiance, but Mother was simply fed up with the ridiculousness of the poor girl's treatment.

Taysha, on the other hand, was not so enthused when she heard the plan. But Mother's enthusiasm quickly wore her down and Taysha quietly accepted whatever was decided on her behalf.

Thanks to an early rush of warm weather, it wasn't long after deciding these things that Mother and three of her friends arrived at the edge of the forest in Anami's stead.

They all held armfuls of baskets and bags full of things.

The day started with them just sitting and talking in Taysha's hut as they spun sheep's wool into yarns and threads. Taysha saw them as a nuisance and started feeling a little restless. But remembering how kind Mother had been to her, she forced herself to relax and enjoy her guests. She learnt a lot of new ideas from the women, such as the recipes for some of the ointments, the different techniques in spinning threads, as well as cloth-making and dyes. This was all welcome information, as she had figured she would be wearing nothing but leathers by the next winter. Her request for a sheep of her own wasn't received so openly though. Mother told her she would see what she could do and the subject was put aside.

The end of the day consisted of the women cleaning out her hut, airing her furs and doing her washing. Taysha found it funny to be doted upon in a feminine manner after all her time with Anami. Though she felt awkward, Taysha enjoyed the attention given her. It reminded her of her Coming of Age ceremony in a way. Some women that she had never seen before also came by to give her scented oils, dried fruits, and pickled vegetables or pressed flowers. The younger girls brought bracelets and necklaces made simply from woven branches or cloth with metal strands or shiny stones. There were even morsels for the wolves. She was happiest when she received a comb and several leather pieces to hold up her hair.

Taysha started feeling as though she was a chief of sorts. Her self-importance showed a bit in the wary eye she kept on the women who were just now coming to introduce themselves. Taysha didn't recognise any of them from the first group that chased her away but she was pretty sure at least one of them were among these newcomers. It was hard for her to distinguish which emotion she should be feeling towards them.

Were they offering an unspoken apology? Or were they trying to sneak in amongst the crowd like cowards? At times Taysha was sure their lips smiled while their eyes told her how much they hoped Adit would beat her without mercy.

Unfortunately, she hadn't the time, energy or language to confront these problems so she tried to put them out of her head as best she could.

In all this she noticed something about herself.

After all her time with the men, she found the busy going-ons of the women foreign. Not because they were a different people. They simply looked as if they were a different breed from her.

These women, it was as if she didn't belong among them.

With a nod of her head, Taysha had to admit to herself that she no longer did.

\- - - - -
On the morning of her fight, Mother and her friends had oiled her body and tied her hair tight to the top of her head. The latter action seemed like a simple task at first but there was a long discussion between the women when one of them objected to her tying Taysha's hair in the same fashion as the Wedic men. Mother argued she would need it high and tight to fight properly. After a lot of back and forth and translating, Taysha decided for them.

"I am warrior. I not woman," she stated boldly, and ended with a quiet, "...Today."

"See?" Mother cooed to her friend, "She is a warrior today and must be prepared as such."

Her hair would be high and tight as necessity dictated.

They tucked a black rabbit fur under the straps of her modesty armour and it gave her a fuller, nobler look. Seeing the effect, Mother added two brown furs to her hips as well. The mood of the women became quieter as they adorned her with the bracelets and a necklace with a yellowish, semi-transparent stone attached. They placed new spring flowers in her hair and one woman applied a reddish cream to her cheeks and lips, finishing with a dark line of charcoal from the end of her eyes.

Seeing Taysha's uncomfortable look, the woman spoke to her, "I don't know if this is proper for a warrior but, regardless of what you say, you are a woman as well."

Yes. She was a woman. A beautiful woman indeed.

The three who had dressed her stood back and were mesmerized by her appearance in the glow of the fire. Taysha didn't look like a child who had put on her father's armour for fun and play. This young woman looked as if she belonged in it ... like she was born to wear it.

"She truly has been chosen by the gods," Mother whispered to all as Taysha looked herself over in the reflective metal she had been given. She sheepishly raised her head to them and said:

"I ... Um ... sorry. I don't think possible I fight like this. Maybe. I don't think I can do. Is too many thing."

The cuteness of the innocence that came from someone who looked so dominating struck the women as funny and they laughed. Taysha looked back at them, a little annoyed.

"Oh, don't worry," Mother said sweetly. "We take everything off at the Training Grounds."

"Everything but the top," joked one of Mother's friends with a tight smile.

"Yes. No more topless fighting. My goodness," Mother replied as she readied herself to step out of the hut, "This is all just for the Entrance anyway."

"For ent'ance..." Taysha repeated as she looked in her mirror once more.

"Wait here. I'll go see if everything is ready at the village," Mother ordered before closing the door behind her.

The two women who remained took advantage of Mother's absence by asking Taysha all they could think of. That would give them an even amount of fuel for the gossiping groups later that day. Taysha looked at them with the same level of trust she had with the two large wolf pups. No reason to distrust them really, but Taysha would have tied the two women to a post while she slept too.

Regardless of Taysha's cautious feelings toward them, they were polite and genuinely interested in all she said. Though at least twice her age, they seemed younger to her in their behaviour, and talking to them helped ease the nervousness.

" _I was less nervous the first fight,"_ she thought, _"This is crazy. What if I pass out or something?"_

Mother ran through the village and down to the Training Grounds finding the necessary people in charge of the various parts of the event. She was a bit surprised to see most of the tribe had already gathered there.

Bajesh and Father stood with folded arms closest to the end that Mother had appeared from and turned to see if she was looking for them. But, she wasn't.

She stood looking around the crowd for someone.

Her eyes stopped on Anami. He was sitting on the bench between the two sides. Beside him sat his father --the Master of Arms from the previous generation-- who would be making the final decision on the fight.

Anami would remain neutral. He would assist his father only if the fighters got too carried away.

Mother was pleased to see Adit at the grounds already. He obviously hadn't planned an entrance himself. That meant all her hard work would absorb the complete attention of the tribe. He sat on a log on the opposite end of the Grounds with his friends. Ironically, it was now he who was topless in his sheep-skin pants and boots as the sun warmed his bare back. His face looked concerned as he sat absentmindedly playing with his bandaged wrist that he had injured on his last day of training. He was obviously thinking of the moments to come and was looking a bit overwhelmed at the grandeur of it all. It was no wonder. It was almost unthinkable how he would carry himself if he actually lost. For a brief moment, Mother felt sorry for the young man.

But it wasn't the time to start re-thinking things.

She caught his eye and used facial expressions to ask if he was ready. He attempted to look upbeat as he signalled back with a wave that any time was good for him, then he hunched back over and chewed on the inside of his cheek.

Mother found the three young boys and three girls she was looking for, gathered them up and ran off with them back through the village and on to Taysha's hut. The boys had brought two drums and a flute. One of the girls had an instrument made from pieces of sinew over a box of dried skin with a hole in it. Taysha thought that it sounded like a strong wind rustling through the trees. The two other girls had baskets full of flower petals that eight girls had taken three days to collect. There were reds and yellows and whites with the odd blue mixed evenly throughout. The baskets were almost as big as they were as they teetered happily at the front of the procession at Taysha's hut.

Needless to say, the moment they had gathered, all the children stood staring at her. Though she wasn't much older than they were, she felt very mature. She felt as if she looked as tall as a tree or as powerful as a goddess. Certainly, she looked unlike any woman in their village.

Mother pulled out Taysha's wolf skin and hung it over her shoulders and tied the leather strips of the head piece under her chin. Over this, her friend put the small shield that Anami had loaned her on her back and tightened the strap across her chest.
Another woman added touch-ups to the colouring on Taysha's face. She was a most awesome sight.

After a moment or two of admiring their work, Mother gave the signal to move. The procession started as the two girls with the petals threw them into the air as they started walking.

"Not now. Not now!" one of the women called to them. "At the Grounds. There's no one to see them here."

The embarrassed little girls proceeded to lead the group back to the village, followed by those with the instruments. Behind them came Taysha with Mother to her left and the one who had put on her make-up close behind Taysha on to her right. The other two followed with banners of white, black and gold.

When they had crossed into the village, they stopped and re-organised the banners, headpieces and garments. Mother signalled for those still lingering in the village to get to the Training Grounds. A couple started out right away while others ignored her completely, obviously uninterested in the whole afair.

When they were satisfied they had nothing else to improve on, the boys drummed and the flute warbled in its high pitch that undoubtedly carried to everyone waiting out of sight behind the trees. The first strum from the girl's instrument sent shivers up Taysha's spine.

"Make way! A warrior approaches!" the one flower-girl cried out and looked back at the adults to check if it met their approval. Mother nodded and signalled to move onwards. The two girls repeated the call as they led the procession to the Grounds.

"Make way! A warrior approaches!" they cried, with their confidence now secure. The unearthly sound of the instruments followed each announcement and was repeated every few steps.

Progress was slow and Taysha tried to calm her breathing and rid herself of the sickening feeling in her stomach. To add to everything, she wished they had tested the wolf skin in advance. The weight of the shield constantly pulled it back off her head making for a less-than-impressive spectacle of her struggling to keep it on with her javelin hand as she walked. At seeing Taysha's struggle, one of the women quickly took off her sash and wrapped it around Taysha's waist, holding the wolf skin in place.

She fixed Taysha's headpiece one last time and they continued her march.

A few stragglers mixed with the parade as it continued through the village. Taysha searched those milling around her for hostile faces.

" _Let them try now,"_ she told herself, _"Let them look at me with scorn now and see what happens."_ She would pierce their arms with her javelin and throw them to the ground before she let them take her confidence away from her again.

Her apparent arrogance didn't come from her increased ability to fight as much as it came from what Anami had taught her.

"The battle is won in taking the opponent's strength ... his confidence. It is there that he loses his will to fight. A child can beat a man who doesn't fight back ... of course, that goes both ways ... that is how you can lose as well."

It made her understand she had lost her first fight because she had given up. It was hard to admit to herself but she knew it to be true. After all, she could have given up the moment Adit put his knee on her but she fought through that. It was only when the fear of not being able to breathe overpowered her that she surrendered. By that rationale, it was she who lost to herself, rather than to Adit. And so now, there were none who could beat her. Not because everyone was weaker, but because she would not allow them to do so.

As she was led through the village in honour, she noticed cowardly shapes in the shadows of the farthest huts. Her eyes fell upon them as she walked by but they seemed to be mostly old women. She thought she recognized the Fat One but there were two others there of equal size and Taysha couldn't tell which one had most offended her so long ago.

Two younger men around Brother's age stood leaning on the last hut with arms crossed and a smile on their face. Taysha didn't smile back. She thought the smiles lacked respect and were mocking her. She would remember these two and if she was right about their smiles being sneers, she would challenge the dogs, as was her right as a pupil of Anami. These two she could beat, she was sure of that.

A pat on her shoulder from Mother brought her back to the business in hand and she fixed her gaze forward as they walked down the wide dirt clearing that led from the village to the Training Grounds. At the slight curve that opened up to the vast clearing, Taysha could see a lot of people dressed in bright colours, gathering at the side of the Grounds. She was surprised to see so many. Even those who obviously didn't like the thought of her being there had come to watch.

She caught Bajesh's smile in the crowd as she rounded the bend and a blast of a horn made her jump a bit. Her stomach started to knot and she needed to go pee. But the event had taken control as if it was an entity on its own and they were swept towards an opening in the wall of people that naturally formed towards the center. The two girls tried to empty their baskets of flower pedals quickly by strewing them in huge handfuls at every step. Taysha was escorted to her side of the arena facing Adit, who sat shuffling his feet in the dirt.

The women proceeded to take off her ornaments as the ring of people closed in behind them. Taysha kept her eyes on the hands of Mother's friends, not wanting to look around. It felt rather strange to be standing in the Training Grounds after having only seen it from across the Wedic river.

The children continued to play their instruments as loudly as they could, now competing with the single horn and growing noise of the excited crowd. Everyone burst into chatter after the initial amazement of seeing the barbarian girl in all her splendour. Many were disappointed she didn't arrive topless as rumour said she would. Nevertheless, she was a sight beyond what any of them had ever seen before. Half bride, half warrior, she looked impressive in her modesty armour, oiled and glistening in the sun. Even so, she stood a head shorter than Adit and most people already pitied her.

Anami's father stood in the middle of the ring and raised his hands to settle the crowd. He then recited the formal introduction to the challenge but neither Taysha nor Adit heard a single word. Adit looked at the girl in make up before him and suddenly had a change of heart. This had become absurd. His eyes dropped to the ground as he waited for Anami's father to finish the recitation. Taysha's eyes widened from reading what his posture and facial expressions were saying to her.

" _I've got him!"_ she told herself as she looked at her opponent staring at his feet, _"He has given his Will to the ground. I will pick it up and use it against him."_

The fear that nervousness brings had turned to a vibrant energy. She began to rock from side to side in anticipation. Adit looked up to see her quite willing and looking forward to testing herself, perhaps even believing she could win.

"You may start at your own time!" finished Anami's father and Taysha looked to him and Anami for confirmation.

"You may start. You may begin," Anami's father repeated to her with a slight nod of his head. She looked back at Adit. He calmly took a step towards the centre of the Grounds and it seemed to be the spark that lit Taysha instantly.

Her first big step towards him was echoed by Adit's to close the distance. Taysha suddenly changed pace and shot quickly towards him. Knowing now not to over-shoot, over-punch or over-kick, she took into consideration the landing points if she missed and blocking options if he caught her before she could deliver the blow. Adit stopped and stabled himself for the tackle or strike and held out his left hand in a ready defence. Taysha then did something not even Anami had expected. She jumped, grabbed hold of Adit's outstretched arm in mid-air, and pulled it towards her as she lifted her knee for his chin.

Though not fully seeing the knee coming, Adit could tell by her pulling motion something bad was about to happen and he instinctively pivoted on his lead foot to turn himself away from her attack. The palm of his right hand had parried her attack with a light smack to the head. Still in mid air, she fell backwards, while keeping hold of his left arm at the wrist. She landed on her back with a thud, but looked as comfortable as if she had fallen into a bed of furs. Without hesitation, she pulled him towards her again as she shot a straight kick to his ribs. It connected. There was an audible smack as her foot hit his side. In Taysha's ears there was an added gift of hearing Adit's sudden expulsion of air.

" _Got you back,"_ she thought.

The pain was more from his injured hand he had smacked her with, but the trouble this girl was giving him, yet again, fired his will to fight. Anger flashed across his face and for the first time his eyes burned into hers.

It scared her more than she wanted to admit and it showed as her tactics suddenly changed from strikes to wrestling. She had learned that a powerful strike was diminished if the opponent was too close.

And she did not want to get hit.

When Adit attempt to pull his arm out of her grip she pushed forwards, diving in under his exposed side and wrapped her arms tight around his waist. Squeezing his ribs, she used his immaculate balance against him by pulling herself to her knees and swinging around to his back. In the instant her feet were planted, she heaved him up off the ground as though she was lifting a heavy stone. She was set to bring him on to his head. Another return-of-kind from their first battle.

Yet even in the air, Adit's experience served him well and he swung his legs in mid-fall to stop her from fully controlling him. The sight of the girl lifting up Anami's top student sent the crowds in fits of cheers and advice yelled to both of them.

Taysha kept him in the air as long as she could but his constant manoeuvring cheated her of her prize. With the few seconds of battle already making her breathe hard, she changed tactics and let go of him. He landed safely on his feet in front of her with a plop. The quickness, and moreover the gentleness, of her release stopped Adit for a moment.

He thought she had given up.

Adit turned to see if they were indeed still fighting when the ball of her foot caught him square in the ribs again.

The crowd cheered wildly as Adit caught her by the ankle and stepped through the pain to kick her still-standing leg out from beneath her. As his foot connected with the side of her calf, he lifted the ankle in his grip high to ensure Taysha would land on her head and the fight would end. But a shot of pain in his ribs prevented him from lifting as high as he would have liked and Taysha's three months of falls and tumbles enabled her to land without much damage.

Adit, confident in her defeat, let her foot go and walked towards the centre of the ring to ensure neither of them ended up with their faces planted on a wooden bench. It gave him a couple moments to stretch his side as well. He watched as Taysha scrambled to her feet. She was definitely in better shape than three months ago.

As for skills?

She could fight.

He would happily admit that. She was probably better than some of the men in the village and definitely better than any girl or woman he knew of.

They faced each other again and Taysha hesitated. For every attack she imagined, she anticipated the unfavourable outcome. Adit just stood with both arms loosely held out in front of him, ready to counter her action. Her hesitation and the noisy crowd frustrated her and she rocked back and forth.

" _Why don't you attack, you shit eater!"_ she barked at him in her mind and in the excitement of the moment her frustration took hold.

"AAAaagg!" she screamed at him and instantly silenced the crowd.

Adit calmly replied with a blank stare, then horribly, he mocked her frustration, "Aaaag," he mimicked dryly.

From the crowd came a few snickers and Taysha's fists drew tight. She once again lunged towards him. Adit had expected another knee or kick and moved back a step to find her already on the ground. She tried to drop out of his line of sight, roll towards him and kick him in his balls with her heel. It was a good try but she dropped far too early, letting Adit see the whole thing.

It at least showed a tactical mind strong enough not to do the same moves again. Even more impressive was her ability to convert the motion of her failed attack. The moment she had completed the roll, she knew Adit had stepped out of harm's way. Instead of putting all her energy on a useless kick, she used the momentum to stand and strike at Adit's knee with her other foot. But Adit knew this move as well and he simply moved his leg to the side to avoided contact.

His movement, combined with Taysha's side kick, had now placed Adit at her side. It was a perfect place for him. It would enable him to make a move on her before she could turn and attack him. The best she could possibly do now is brace for the impact when he threw her. Perhaps his ability to see the possible outcome in advance is what clouded his vision to what couldn't possibly happen.

Before he could move in to grab her around the waist, she had adjusted her motion from a sideways kick to a sideways leap in an excellent show of skill and intelligent fighting.

She brought her extended leg back and kicked hard at the top of Adit's knee. Though the weight difference seemed to be in Adit's favour, it also bounced Taysha back out of harms way. The crowd roared again, cheering on both fighters and Adit did a foolish thing. He straightened up to show her kick did not hurt him in the least.

He presented himself in a most familiar position to Taysha. Her unexpected tackle brought Adit onto his back. He fell unhurt and unworried as he had long since studied the art of falling to the ground. He knew that in Taysha's inexperience, the young barbarian would wear herself out in the usual fashion of beginner fighters, finishing the fight for him. This is what she was doing now. Her power and energy was completely focused on holding Adit's legs that weren't even moving.

"Slow down, Taysha! Slow down," Taysha's ears suddenly picked up Bajesh's voice among the crowd, "Breathe and move slowly. He's not fighting against you. Don't use up your energy!"

His voice cleared her head. He was right. And more importantly, she was winning. She was enjoying herself and she would have laughed out loud if she could have.

She lay there holding Adit's legs from the side as she felt him slowly shift his weight to sit up while keeping her from moving by pushing on the side of her head.

She recalculated her situation and suddenly let go of his legs, using the upper arm to lash out at his face with a clenched fist. She caught him hard on the side of the head but at the release of her grip, Adit had quickly moved his legs around behind him far enough to sit up on his knees. He was now in a better position than Taysha who still lay on the ground.

"Get up! Get up!"

She remembered that same call of advice from the first fight and she rolled away to get to a safe place so she could get up on her feet. But Adit had decided that wouldn't happen twice. He lunged after her and pushed her down with one hand as he pulled out a leg with the other.

In the moment it took to understand what was happening to her, Adit was already sitting on her back holding her head in the dirt.

"Surrender!" he yelled at her over the noise of the crowd. He hoped to the gods she knew what surrender meant.

The spectators drew silent, recognising the fight was over. There was little she could do to overturn this situation. Taysha's legs flapped helplessly like a fish as she held onto Adit's hand that was now clenched around her hair.

Bajesh had hope, remembering her brilliant escape from the first fight, but any advice he could give would not work. Even though he could see her trying to do what he advised, Adit heard every word and countered her movements, rendering them useless.

"Surrender!" Adit yelled again.

Apart from Taysha's struggling no other noise was heard. Even Bajesh had joined the ranks of everyone waiting to hear her say it.

Adit turned to Anami, "Does she understand?"

Along with the nod from Anami came Taysha's reply,

"No! No! I no surr'nder! Goose! You are goose!"

"Goose?" Adit repeated, thinking it must be a translation from her language at some kind of insult. It wasn't really, but it was the best she could come up with in the moment. In her language she would have called out "maggot" but didn't know the word in Wedic. She could have called a "wolf", but it seemed to her more of a compliment. So, until she learned some proper Wedic curse words, a _goose_ he was.

"What you do now, ei?" she taunted him from underneath, her mouth spitting out the mud and dirt she had inhaled, "You stay forever? Hold my head in dirty?" she yelled defiantly.

Adit looked to Anami for advice on what to do. Wouldn't he end the fight? Anami only stood with his arms crossed, looking at Taysha. It was obvious the fight would continue until the spirits were harmonised. That was the whole purpose of the event: to establish each person's place in the social order. And more importantly, it was done to accept one's place.

This girl was not accepting her place. Adit would have to beat her as Anami would surely beat him if he ever had the audacity to challenge him.

Neither Anami nor his father offered any signs of interference and the Council had no power here. It would be Adit's and Taysha's decision and theirs alone.

Taysha had stopped squirming. She was now using the tactic shown to her by Adit. She would lie and wait until her chance came. Adit grabbed at her right arm, and with Taysha struggling anew, finally found a position behind her back that hurt her.

"Surrender!" he yelled as she started to scream.

The sound of the girl screaming in pain, dealt from his own hands sickened him. He had had enough of this thing. This barbarian. Fighting girls. Shit.

He jumped up, quickly landing his knees into her back and smacked her across the top of her head with his open hand like he would do to a little sister or annoying child.

Then suddenly, he stepped back.

His kept his eyes down and head wobbling at the ridiculous situation it had become. Still, he was wise enough to do so out of striking range.

"Stupid girl," he said back to the dirty-faced barbarian cradling her twisted arm, "You wanna fight like a man? Fine. We can fight. Come on."

Taysha finally understood what Anami had been telling her about the Will to Fight. She could feel it leave her body like a breath of air, and she hesitated.

Before she could decide how to react, Anami's father stood and addressed her from his position across the ring

"Do you surrender?"

Taysha didn't know what to do.

She looked up at Anami who looked back at her without expression. She broke their gaze. She wouldn't know what he thought until after the fight, but she was pretty sure he was disappointed in her. More than that, she didn't want to lose to this guy again. Not after three full months of solid training.

"Do you surrender?" the aged warrior repeated.

"No," she answered in a small voice and helped herself up with her good arm.

Adit shook his head as he raised his arms in disbelief.

Taysha had absolutely no idea what to do, but she felt it better to end it face to face than having the stupid boy sitting on her like some sort of stinky, older brother.

Tired of the continuous thinking, she brushed the dirt from her face and simply started to walk towards Adit. He stood unmoving as she approached and she calmly reached out to grab his hair with her right hand. Adit smacked her forearm out of his line of sight and started to reach out for the side of her neck so he could use the leverage to trip her to the ground. He figured he would just throw her down as many times as she stood back up. It was a better way to end the fight in the eyes of the other people than breaking her arm or smashing her face into the ground until she became unconscious. This way the constant shock to the entire body would tire her out beyond being able to stand and they would have to declare him the victor.

But before his hand could find its place on her neck, the Taysha's right elbow found its target right over Adit's eye.

When he had hit her forearm, he had made the terrible mistake of smacking it in front of his body, instead of away from him. Taysha had let the impact of his parry move her arm around as she folded it naturally at the elbow and pushed herself forward.

Though it was a brilliant move by Taysha, the force wasn't enough to alter Adit's plan. He grabbed Taysha by the neck and started to bring his foot in to kick her legs out from underneath her. But, unknown to him, Taysha had seen blood. Her pointy elbow had cut him across his brow like a knife and the skin just above his eye split open. Taysha saw the skull a moment before it started to bleed.

Feeling Adit's grip on the side of her neck sent her into a panic and she followed his force with a swing of her left fist. Adit had her held out at the end of his outstretched arm and her fist swung past him, just missing his nose. Still, the strike was enough to alleviate the pressure he had on her, lessening the effect of his side kick. In fact, Taysha didn't even notice the kick at all.

The blood from Adit's cut had already started to drip off the left eyebrow. He pushed back on her chest to get her away from him for a moment and she swung at him with her right fist, hitting nothing than the space between them.

The attempt hardly registered with Adit, certainly not compared with the sting from the cut and the blood now in his eye. He raised his left hand to check the damage as Taysha surged forward with a series of blows, desperate to end the fight in her favour. The shooting pain in her right arm was numbed by the rush of adrenaline and the view of her enemy retreating before her.

Then it happened.

Taysha was suddenly faced with Bajesh kneeling over her.

"What are you doing?" she asked in Osfer, annoyed at Bajesh's sudden intervention. Then as she tried to step away, she realised she was not standing.

"What happen?" she asked in Wedic.

"Adit knocked you out," he said as some of the surrounding people called over to the others of her conscious state.

"Adit?" Taysha had no idea what he was talking about until she tried to sit up and the pain from her arm and shoulder shot feeling back into her body.

"Agh," she groaned and lay back down cradling her arm. "Why is Adit? What he do?" she asked, still confused.

"He knocked you out. Bam! Plop." Bajesh motioned a fist to the side of the head and rolled his eyes back in their sockets before imitating Taysha falling down.

Those around her helped her sit and she remained there, holding her arm and trying to figure things out when a concerned looking Anami made his way through the crowd and squatted down in front of her.

"Do you know me?" he asked.

"Yes. Anami," she answered without thinking why he was asking.

"What's your name?" he asked.

"Taysha." she answered and added to Anami's delight, "Adit knok't me out."

His laughter was soon followed by that of the others around her and they helped her to stand. The sudden rush of blood to her head provided the proof of Adit's victory. She stood weak-kneed and the side of her head hurt something fierce.

Apparently, in her attempt to finish the fight with the blows from her fist, she threw caution to the wind and ran recklessly towards Adit. He had pulled his body back to avoid her right fist and thrust forward with a clenched fist of his own. The blow was aimed for anywhere near the head. In his panic, he had hit her with full force on the temple and she had crumpled like a wet cloth at his feet.

In the silence of the shocked crowd that followed and the sudden rush forward of Anami and his father, Adit honestly thought he had killed her. Visions of never finding a bride, being expelled from the tribe or being beaten or worse flashed through his head in an instant. He was relieved to find no one thought him the villain; quite the opposite in fact. All believed he had behaved honourably under the circumstances. Many believed he could have started the fight that way and never give the girl a chance. He was seen as having taken a small beating to appease her honour and he was praised mightily for it. Yes, Adit was elevated in the eyes of his people that day. He was even more relieved to hear the girl had revived and was now standing among the group that had formed around her where she fell.

The barbarian girl had improved drastically over the last three months. The first fight was a combination of him being careless, a lucky hit from her, and a bruised nose that made it anything but easy. This time there was no luck in any of the strikes that had landed or even those that had missed. He had been cautious and every action carefully calculated. She had lifted him off the ground as easily as he could have lifted her. And along with another tell-tale facial wound that he would have to wear on open display, Anami told him his rib might be cracked.

The crowd around Taysha started moving towards Adit. He stood waiting with a blood-stained cloth wrapped around his head and holding his ribs. The crowd of men parted to reveal the short girl that had given him so much trouble.

"Ah!" Taysha smiled with a tired satisfaction and pointed to him holding his side.

"Yeah, yeah. I know," Adit retorted and added softly, "Are you all right?"

The show of concern sent an unexpected lump to Taysha's throat.

All she could do was shrug, and roll her eyes back and forth as if to check the senses in her head.

"Head is here, there, here, there..." she said while swinging her hand around her head to show she felt dizzy, "but, I think ... all right."

"Good," Adit said as he held out his right hand towards her.

This time she reached out and held it of her own accord and said in a strong voice:

"I don't know words!"

After the immediate laughter, Anami led her through each phrase of the Acceptance of Defeat. It wasn't long until those around her were saying it with her in a clear show of support.

Mother stood with Father's arm around her as she quietly wiped the tears from her eyes. This barbarian girl who showed so much fighting spirit and fought with so much honour was undeniably sent by the gods to their care.

\- - - - -
Mother had originally planned a feast in honour of the two regardless of the outcome of the fight. It was a quiet arrangement that had been carefully organised just out of the ears of the Council and others that would certainly oppose it. The tribe hadn't had an event for warriors for many years. Marriage, Days of Birth, Coming of Age, the Second Coming of Age, Funerals, but for warriors... this was a celebration long in coming. It was only possible by declaring it a part of Anami's jurisdiction as Master-of-Arms, so the Council had little sway over the matter.

Now at the Training Grounds, the plan was presented openly. It was impossible to stop, regardless of who slunk off with a scowl. The tide of Taysha's new popularity would not easily be turned back. The Ceremony of the Warrior had begun. The men cheered at the excuse to drink, and Bajesh started to help Taysha to the village.

Taysha looked back to the Grounds to find her things gone.

" _Oh well. I knew it would happen someday,"_ she thought but then remembered her wolf skin. That, she would not so easily let go of.

"My wolf," she said to Bajesh, pointing over her shoulder.

"Don't worry. Mother and her friends have all your things. Even the flowers."

He smiled at her proudly as he helped his dirty, blood-stained warrior up the road.

To keep a night of peace, the Council members convinced their supporters no law was being broken, and most of them joined the crowd by the fire. It was a pittance of a concession. At any case, the central fire was already being built up and the food and wine brought to the outdoor tables.

With no overhanging trees in the village, the Wedic fire pit was twice as large as Taysha remembered the Amazoi's to be. It was big enough for her to lie in it in any direction. The half-logs around it were arranged in a ring with lower ones up front and higher ones behind them. The organisers had propped up Adit and Taysha on a pile of sheep furs on wooden planks for them to rest their backs on.

Adit sat higher in honour of his victory.

Four giggling girls around Taysha's age had been chosen to apply muscle ointments and healing creams to the two warriors' wounds. There had been a short discussion on whether they should substitute Taysha's girls with boys, but Mother couldn't find any of the shy young men brave enough to do it.

The girls massaged the ointment into their thighs and arms and covered them with loose white shirts and a skirt wrapping for the bottom. Taysha figured it was to keep the stink of the ointment off the furs they sat on. Taysha felt her armour digging into her side, so she took it off under the shirt and placed it beside her.

Taysha unexpectedly locked eyes with one of the girls who was looking at her armour piece. The young woman smiled up at her.

"You're very pretty," she said to Taysha as she gathered up the ointments. She was a small, delicate girl with the biggest eyes Taysha had ever seen. The way she looked at her made Taysha's heart beat fast. The femininity she showed made Taysha feel strange, as though she was twice the girl's age, or something like she was a boy.

Before the girl left, Taysha managed to blurt out, "How many winter ... uh, how old ... are you?"

"I'm sixteen years."

"I am fifteen. Maybe sixteen, too. I don't know," she said with a smile. Then she felt embarrassed. Taysha found that she suddenly didn't know how to act around another girl.

Thankfully, the girl bowed quickly and stepped out of the way of another young woman bringing a cup of fresh blood from the slaughtered sheep and handed it to Adit.

He took a mouthful and swallowed it then passed it to Taysha. She looked to see what it was and looked back at Adit. He was making a manly sort of face and stuck out his tongue to make a show of having drunk it so boldly. She smiled and took the bowl.

If he could do it, so could she.

The surrounding villagers let out a short cheer as Taysha gulped in down in one breath. She looked around surprised. Apparently she had done something right. She looked up at Adit questioningly. He raised his left arm with a flex of his muscle.

Taysha followed his lead and another cheer erupted from those around them.

Adit went back to talking with his friends and Taysha looked around to see Anami, Mother and Father busy with one thing or another. Her eyes inadvertently caught the girl she had talked to. She gave Taysha another smile before she disappeared into the busy crowd. It was obvious they would become friends later. Now there was too much commotion going on to focus on one person.

Taysha felt movement behind her and looked back to see Bajesh and someone else adjusting the large flat plank of wood that sat straight up and down behind her, securing it properly so she wouldn't fall backwards. Bajesh didn't look too happy, as if someone had purposefully set the back of her chair so she would fall. But, again, there was too much going on to stay focused on one thing.

A large group gathered around Adit. The young men gave polite looks, nods and smiles at Taysha. She would smile politely before quickly looking away. She knew what they were wanting. Though happy at the thought, she didn't want to encourage anyone. From behind her, Bajesh added Taysha's wolf fur over the top of her backboard.

"I'll go feed Ushi and Wada. This will go on for a while," he whispered into her ear, "And drink some wine," he added, pointing to the man standing in front of her offering her an empty bowl. "It'll kill the taste of blood." He made a yucky face and went off towards her hut.

She took the bowl from the man and another man with a skin flask poured the now familiar fermented berry juice for her. She had a harder time with the first mouthful of alcohol than the blood, much to the amusement of the few that had gathered around her.

"Not all of it at once," Adit said to her, "Little bits. Little bits."

"Little bids," she repeated and took another sip.

She sat and watched as the three large cooking spits were dropped into place: one with the freshly killed sheep, one with the remnants of a boar, and one with five or six geese packed together. It was spring and they could afford a little excess and to feast on fresh meat.

Side coals were scraped over to the far end where four little old women sat making flat bread for the large tribe as quickly as they could, smacking the eager hands of the naughty boys and the old men that tried to steal one out of turn. Some of the men had brought out instruments and the quick rhythm of the Wedic music set Taysha's toes wiggling in her boots.

Food and drink was constantly brought before them and Taysha had pastes, bread, meat, water, tea, a simple soup with a fishy taste, two types of wine and a drink of fermented honey that Taysha liked very much. The pain in her shoulder numbed and her tongue loosened. At one point Adit had leaned over to her with his hand sweeping over the festivities in their honour.

"We should have fought earlier!" he laughed.

"Yes. Again tomorrow maybe?" she joked back.

"Oh no," he said with a mock solemn expression, "Not tomorrow. I shall be busy crying all day."

Taysha, being a little tipsy, joined the others in their laughter. Most of the original admirers had gradually found a place on the bench by her feet and they asked Taysha about her family and what had happened to her. When Taysha's mood became too dark, Adit shouted out:

"These things are to be spoken on another day! Today is Taysha's day of happiness! She is a woman above women. And a woman above a few of the men, I might add..." he jested merrily with a telltale look at his friends. He stumbled to his feet and, held up by his supporters, he called out for all to listen:

"To Taysha! We ... all salute you!" He led a cheer to raised cups and bowls of wine and mead.

Anami stood happy and drunk, with his wife under his arm, receiving his share of praise for his fine students. Father and Mother had a quick smoke of the pipe. They too sat together as Mother leaned on his shoulder and both stared into the fire in between listening to the conversations of others who came up to them.

Bajesh sat quietly to the side and ate, but drank little. Friends would come and go in drunken glee encouraging him to join in more but he told them he was keeping his mind clear because he was worried about Taysha's hit to the head. He wanted to keep an eye on her. He sat watching his people, his friends, his family and mostly, his woman.

He thought again that he must feel about her in the same way that she felt for her wolves. Every day she stayed with him was precious, knowing she could be gone the next morning.

Bajesh's brother was sitting near the bread-makers with his entourage of friends until they had sufficient drink to convince Brother to introduce them to Taysha. He led them over and started to introduce them as though he was good friends with her. This annoyed Bajesh but greatly pleased Taysha, who had reached the "everyone's my friend" stage of drunkenness.

Then she recognized the two young men who had been leaning against the hut with their arms crossed when she was led through the village earlier that day.

"You!" she pointed to them with inhibitions completely dissolved, "You laugh at me. There!" she pointed to where they were standing at the point of transgression. They saw her drunken state and in their own swaying world looked at each other mockingly.

"Did you laugh at her?" one asked the other.

"Me? Don't be silly? It must have been you."

Taysha recognized the routine. It was the same one the older boys in her own village used. She leant against the backboard and narrowed her eyes at them.

"You want challenge me?" she drawled.

"Challenge you?" said the one waving his free hand at her. "Don't be silly. You would _kill_ us."

He offered her a low bow full of both humour and respect. "Your servant," he added as the second followed suit. It continued with all the group members until Brother and his friends joined those bowing at her feet. Movement in the village stopped for a while at the spectacle.

"See?" Adit whispered, with a tap on her arm, "It's good."

"It's good!" she yelled and raised her cup, leading the tribe in cheer and drink.

Aided by a bit of wine, a very drunken Council elder waddled his way over and sat between Adit and Taysha's admirers. She recognized him as the decision maker in the middle, that day of the meeting. The elder Dinesh. She wasn't too pleased about his appearance before her. Father noticed the possible problem and moved over to be within earshot.

The drunk elder ignored, or was completely oblivious to, the attention he had created as he sat waving his arms as if to some unheard melody, trying to explain his thoughts.

"I ... want to say ... to you. Good girl. Thaaat ... I must uphold the choishess, the choidse. The, uh ... Does she understand what I'm saying? The _decisions_ made by Council. It is our law, you see. It is ... well, it is our law... but I want to say we are guided by the godsh, jusht as you are. Shometimes we musht make choishes we do not like. Such is life. Sugis life ... Suchis life. We carry on. I want to say to you. You are a good girl. And I wish great thingsh for you and I am honoured to meet you. The godsh plan big thingsh for you. You arrre a good girl."

During Elder Dinesh's ramblings Bajesh had moved over to Taysha's ear level and translated the main idea of what he was trying to say.

She leaned over to Dinesh and stopped his babbling by handing him her bowl of wine.

"Oh," his eyes widened and he smiled, "Such a nish girl. Such a nice girl. I'm so sorry. Well mannered," he mumbled as he saluted Taysha with her bowl of wine. She gave as low a bow of her head as she deemed fit for the man. By the looks of the people around her, it seemed an adequate gesture.

"Come on, Papa." one of the men said as he helped his father up by the arm.

"Sho sorry. Terrible thing. Poor girl. Alone outthere."

"Yes Papa. She understands. Let's go," his son added with a sorrowful look at Taysha before leading him away.

The group silence that followed was broken as Taysha snickered: "He take my wine..." she whispered to those around her in mock accusation.

The laughter recaptured the mood of the festivities and more cups were raised in her honour. She was a good sport, of good virtue, all right. And she was merciful to her enemies.

A new bowl of wine was handed to her immediately.

\- - - - -
The next morning Taysha felt the same as when she woke up on the Training Ground after taking Adit's punch to the head. She tried to focus her eyes, but couldn't. She knew she was lying on her back in the pitch black. By the smell, she thought she was most likely in her own hut.

"Ah!" The word crossed her lips as the memory of kissing Adit flashed through her mind.

" _Oh no. Where was Bajesh?"_ She tried to sort through the pieces of memories of the night before.

She could tell by his breathing that Bajesh was sleeping next to her, so obviously things hadn't taken the wrong path. She could also make out that someone was sleeping under the furs across the fire pit. So she had made it back to her hut with Bajesh and whoever was still there, but she couldn't remember who. Her stomach started turning and she figured it best to sit up and move outside.

Her head felt terrible. She leaned over to restart the fire as the cool of the morning blanketed her naked shoulders. A surge of sickness engulfed her stomach at the first blow onto the coals.

"Ooup!" She tried to hold it in as she dashed out of the hut naked and into the midday rain.

"Bleaaha!" Right on her Training Grounds.

"Blahhaaaa! Blehhhh..."

The steam rose from the vomit on the ground. The air was still freezing and she started to shiver as she crouched in the light drizzle trying to calm her stomach. Seeing it wasn't going to settle soon, she tiptoed back over the wet grass to grab a fur from inside her hut.

No one had woken and the fire remained unstirred. She looked over to her unknown guest trying to remember who it was as she grabbed her boots, a tunic and fur just as her head started to reel. It felt like monthly cramps but she knew that's not what it was.

She turned to see Ushi nosing towards her vomit, but before she could do anything another wave hit her.

"Beleeahhh!"

She just made it next to the hut, holding her head away from her clothes.

"Peh. Peh," she spat, "Phooey."

Jumping from one foot to the other, she put on her boots as she hopped over to the natural shelter of evergreens in her old camp. She put on her winter tunic, bundled herself in her fur cloak, and waited for the next wave of nausea. All the while trying to figure out what had taken place the night before.

"Yeah. I definitely kissed Adit," she admitted to herself and recalled their short passionate embrace as she came back from peeing in the woods.

" _He obviously followed me there."_

Their fling didn't last long and Adit had broken contact as quickly as it had begun. She remembered swaggering back towards the fire but couldn't recall seeing Bajesh.

"Oh no. He didn't drink at all. Oh no..."

She remembered Bajesh dragging her back out of the village late in the night. She was yelling and laughing about something. From what she could tell, she was challenging one of the unknown men to a fight. She could still see him laughing and waving back to her, saying, "All right. Next time."

She felt like such a fool. Oh, and before that she danced.

" _Oh damn me..."_

She had decided the Wedic style of dancing was too tame and had been dancing topless on the food tables until a couple men lifted her down and one of the girls helped her back into her armour. All the while Taysha was laughing and talking to them in her native language.

" _Oh gods."_ She put her face in her hands in embarrassment at the recollection, _"So much for my acceptance into their tribe. Oh well, easy to get, easy to lose, ei?"_

"Oooooo. Euah. Euah," she started dry-heaving into her old fire pit.

"Phew ... this is horrible," she muttered through her spit, "I'm never drinking again."

She caught a flash of the image of the girl who had helped her back into her armour. She was the one who had said she was pretty. Then the realization hit her.

"Oh," she blurted out, "It's her. She's in the hut..."

Taysha had a sudden recollection of how the girl had sat between her legs on the lower bench as they shared wine from the same bowl.

Thankfully, by that time, most of the other villagers had gone to their huts and the few remaining ones were indulging in heavy drinking.

Taysha remembered talking to the girl a lot, though she couldn't remember what about. She figured she must have sounded like a complete idiot, speaking confidently in a language she had only started learning six months ago.

"What an idiot," she told herself and spat out another taste of vomit from her mouth.

The memory of her kissing the girl as the others sang and some danced also flashed through her mind. At some point in the night, an elder, fed up with the commotion, had yelled out from his hut that it was time they all went to bed. It was then Taysha invited the revellers to her camp and they needed no coercing. She remembered Bajesh's cousin, Ashritha, and her husband choosing to stay behind which made Taysha unhappy, because she like both of them a lot. It suddenly dawned on her.

"Ah. That's who I was challenging to fight. Oh no ... Ashritha will probably never want to see me again. She was so nice too..."

Taysha had started talking to herself out loud, hoping it would calm the sickness she felt.

"I was challenging him to a fight. It was because he and Ashritha didn't come with us. Oh, cunts. Gods be damned. I was yelling at them at the middle of the night. The village will hate me." She sat crouched with her head in her hands imagining everyone coming to take back what they had given her.

"Ah! My things! Where's my wolf skin?"

She went to stand up and go look in her hut but the nausea hit her again and she figured she would just find out later anyway. Her thoughts went back to the girl.

"What was her name? Bahnu? Benu? Bobo? Something like that."

She started to remember them playing naked in the hut with Bajesh and ... was there an _and_? It might not have just been the three of them. Taysha's mind took her through pieces of the details of their night ... her playing with the girl while feeling Bajesh in her from behind.

"Ah, wait. No. there was more than three of us..."

Taysha's mind went blank at the realization.

Ironically, it wasn't the face but the penis she remembered. There was an extra one of those for sure. She couldn't for the life of her remember the owner of the member. She did figure out it wasn't Adit, or Anami, or Bajesh's brother because she could remember when each of them had walked off with their partners or group of friends. Brother was taken back to his hut by his girlfriend half passed out well before Taysha even started her dancing on the table.

"Taysha?" she heard a call from outside her hut.

"Here," she ground out through her teeth, trying not to be sick again.

A few moments later Bajesh came jogging up to her with everything but his tunic on.

"Yeuk?" he joked, using their first common word.

"Yuk," she answered and spat.

"Yeah. I know. That's why I don't drink... much."

"No. Me too. Never again," she declared with another spit. She took a couple breaths to calm herself before asking,

"I am stupid yesterday's night?" she asked as she shot a side glance at Bajesh. He breathed in as if searching for the right words and rolled his tongue in his mouth. He couldn't talk really. They had all shared quite an adventure earlier that morning with Bahnu and Tapal, the young man Taysha was trying to remember.

Tapal was the one who had smiled at Taysha before her fight. He, Taysha, and Bahnu had started to become very _friendly_ from the time they were still in the village and Bajesh was very happy to move them out of eye and earshot of the tribe. At least out of sight of those he deemed unworthy to see this side of her.

The five others that came with them to Taysha's hut were people he felt he could trust. They danced and sang by Taysha's outdoor fire, while Bajesh played host, filling cups and fetching wood for the fire. He had actually had a bit of wine himself but hadn't been drinking as long as the rest.

When the sky started turning bright, the others had left the four alone. Bajesh could understand Tapal's desire to stay but was surprised to see Taysha had somehow convinced sweet Bahnu not to return to her mother.

Though recalling the later parts of the night were embarrassing, he was happy he wasn't so drunk he would forget. They had been like a handful of worms, wriggling and slimy. Tapal made a joke about it being his first bath of spring and Taysha slurred something about how they would all have to have a proper Amazoi bath together...

"Stupid?" he repeated Taysha's question to her, "Ah ... drunken fun. Drunken fun."

He recalled seeing her kiss Adit. It was only one kiss and Adit had initiated it, so he felt it was not worth mentioning.

" _Can't blame him actually,"_ thought Bajesh, _"He should be commended for his willpower for not trying to do more."_

"Drunken. Fun..." Taysha repeated quietly with the bits of last night's highlights flashing through her head, "Who in hut?"

"Ah, you don't remember?" Bajesh half-questioned, with a nervous laugh.

"A little," Taysha replied, "Like head is broken..."

"Broken? Your memory? Little bits, you mean," he corrected. "It's Bahnu and Tapal," he said with a slight smile.

"Ahhhh. Yes. Bahnu," she repeated, saying her name with a sigh of relief, "I like Bahnu."

"Yes, we could tell." he smiled at her with a sly look.

"Ho hoooo..." she laughed mockingly in half amusement, "And who is Tapal?"

Bajesh threw his head up and laughed. He thought about how to describe him for a moment, then stood erect before bowing low to her.

"Your servant," he said, mimicking Tapal's voice.

"Aiyaaaa," she moaned in realization of all the people it could have been.

"Yeah, aiya! Nice _servant_ you have."

"Servant?" she repeated, trying to remember the new word, "Yes. I see," she flashed a knowing look about last night.

It was funny how Life gave unexpected gifts.

As if summoned, Tapal's voice was heard calling out to Bajesh on the other side of Taysha's hut.

"Here!" Bajesh answered from the forest. Tapal came into view around the hut and crouched down to see them.

"I've got to get chores done," he called over, "I have no idea how far into the day we're at," he added with a look up at the grey sky.

"Me neither," called back Bajesh, finding it funny how they were talking so nonchalantly after having shared his woman last night. Or more precisely, earlier that morning.

"It must be past midday," he guessed, as Tapal put on his clothes. When he had dressed he came closer and leaned down below the tree branches to get a better view of them.

"Is she all right?" he asked.

Taysha responded by raising her fist in the air in victory but kept her eyes focused on the small budding tree that helped stable her.

"Don't worry," Tapal said to her, "you'll feel better after more sleep. I always do."

He turned to Bajesh with a look of seriousness.

"If you need to have words with me ... about last night?"

"No, it's good," smiled Bajesh, appreciating his gesture.

"You know you both have my respect," Tapal continued to make sure.

"Thank you," Bajesh said again with a smile, and Tapal took his leave.

When Taysha started losing the feeling in her legs, she felt lying in the hut was a better alternative than lying on the wet ground. Bajesh helped her back and Taysha almost threw up the moment she saw the wolves at her first pool of vomit. Bajesh shooed them with a kick in the air and Taysha practically fell into her hut mumbling something about "disgusting beasts."

Bajesh kept the door open to let in the light, and more importantly the air, when he noticed Bahnu sleeping naked on the furs behind the freshly stoked fire that either she or Tapal had rekindled.

He couldn't help smiling to himself.

"Quite the adventure last night," he said without much thought. Of all the girls in the village, he was surprised, but happy it had been Bahnu.

\- - - - -
Bahnu was, without doubt, one of the most sought after, yet aloof members of the tribe. She was short and looked so fragile as though she was made to be picked up and cradled like a baby. She was quiet yet always had a smile. She was also a natural beauty; undoubtedly the main fantasy of each man in the village at one point or another. It was almost as if she was too beautiful to be possessed, and something about her made it difficult to approach her.

Every one of the Wedic knew what that _something_ was.

Bajesh remembered the day well. He could still clearly see the four men carrying the crippled man back to the village and the time it took for him to die. During a hunt, Bahnu's father had moved towards a dying stag to cut its throat after a particularly hard kill. But the stag was not yet dead, nor finished in its fight for life, and it thrust its antlers deep into his stomach and ribs.

It was a stupid and horrible way to die. Even more so because he died as Bahnu and her mother watched helplessly. They were so deeply affected by the event and pitied by the tribe. Yet, in her mother's inconsolable despair and Bahnu's undying affection for her mother, they had both become somewhat insane.

Everyone had gotten to a point where they thought their grieving should end, but they didn't know what to say any more. The two were thus treated kindly and with special care as one does to those who have let their minds wander. This general attitude of the tribe was largely responsible for making Bahnu the way she was.

Although part of the village, she – like Taysha – had a certain privilege of living outside the social rules of the Wedic.

As far as he knew, Bahnu only had sex with one other; an older man who was married. He stopped being alone with her when they were found out. Bahnu had not been blamed for the indiscretion but something important was taken from her when their relationship was forced to end and she withdrew back into herself even more.

\- - - - -
From what Bajesh could recall from last night, Bahnu had been incredibly sensual, making sure to give attention to all of them. For the first time, he saw her completely. It was as though she had a place with Taysha and Bajesh. They were like a family of misfits who didn't quite fit the Wedic expectations of normal. And that, he didn't mind one bit.

"I have to go do chores," he whispered to Taysha, "Are you going to be all right?"

"Mmmmf," she replied as she squirmed closer to him, telling him with her touch she would be all right but also didn't want him to go.

"All right but I've got to go," he whispered closer to her ear, "I'll see you again later tonight."

She opened one eye and smiled at him briefly.

Bajesh put a copper cooking pot by her with a little water in it.

"Use it to drink or use it to throw up in," he said, and started back to the village.

Bajesh returned to find most people still asleep. Father and Mother were still in bed. Brother was gone somewhere, as was Grandmother. Father woke to Bajesh looking for fresh clothes. In a hoarse voice, he let him know there would be no chores to be done that day.

When Bajesh got back to Taysha's, he found Bahnu sitting up and holding the fur up across her chest as she built the fire. By the gods, she was beautiful. Bajesh didn't know what he had done to be so greatly favoured by the gods, but whatever it was, he prayed he would not fall out of it. He already found himself wishing Bahnu was as free as Taysha concerning nudity.

But Bahnu was, after all, from his tribe.

"You all right?" he asked.

"Ick. No," she responded, sticking her tongue out characteristically. Still, she hid her discomfort well as she sat rubbing her eyes.

"Noooooo. No all right," came a sleepy reply from Taysha that told exactly how she was feeling.

"Here." Bahnu replied as she moved over and gave her lap a pat, "Come lie here."

Bahnu crawled over to Taysha still holding the fur up across her breasts as she did. It was probably done more from the cold than from embarrassment. Bajesh let himself watch freely, feeling it was within his right to do so now.

Bahnu positioned herself with her back to the wall and stroked the poor hung-over girl's back. Taysha wiggled over to her lap and let Bahnu stroke her hair.

The girls ended up falling asleep, and Bajesh did his cooking at the old camp fire to keep the smell from making them sick. The group had brought back a virtual storehouse of food from the night before. It was a good thing the wolves had been tied up all night or it would have been ruined.

He had to laugh when he remembered how he had gotten in trouble from Taysha for once having tried to use her lifting stones to build the food storage it all sat in. At least it would be safe from most scavengers. Especially mice.

They were the worst.

Bajesh was too busy organising the food storage to notice when Anami came by to check on Taysha. He then tip-toed away from the entrance. It was then Bajesh notice his presence.

"Morning teacher." Bajesh greeted.

"Is there someone else in there?" Anami asked Bajesh when he went over to him.

Bajesh turned around surprised, more guilty about the amount of food he had strew about than anything, but Anami didn't seem to notice or care.

"No," he lied.

"Oh, you sneaky wolf," Anami joked back at him, not pushing to find out who it was exactly.

He and Bajesh spent a good time quietly talking and laughing about the night before, recapturing the action of the fight and their horror as Taysha fell in a crumpled heap on the ground. Both praised her and Adit alike and had many good things to say about the tribe's support of her. They laughed and shook their heads over Elder Dinesh's drunken confession of admiration to Taysha.

"I couldn't understand half of what he was saying," Bajesh laughed about his trouble trying to translate to an equally drunk Taysha.

"Ah, no matter. The old Fool wouldn't admit to any of it, even if he could remember himself."

They sighed as their conversation came to a close. Anami looked at Bajesh quietly with a smile and placed his hand on his shoulder. Sometime over the last few months, Bajesh had grown to become a man. And a good man like his father.

Bajesh, in the moment of silence, recognized a hint of admiration towards him and realized this was the first time he had talked and joked with Anami as an equal.

It felt good.

Anami patted his shoulder firmly and nodded in a sign of their mutual understanding before he turned to walk back to the village.

"I'll tell everyone you're both tired and sleeping for the day so they come later," he said as he was leaving.

"Adit's in bad shape," he added, "Throwing up everywhere. Hahaha."

Bajesh stood and watched until Anami walked out of sight. Anami's comment of 'everyone coming later' reminded him of the custom to congratulate the challenger for a good fight. He let his fingers run through his light beard, as he sat and thought of the numbers he would have to play host to later that day.

For some reason, Bajesh felt like walking out to the field and letting the rain fall on his face for a while.

And that's exactly what he did.

\- - - - -
That day, Bahnu went home, much to the sadness of all three of them. Bajesh tried not to show it too much, though.

Bahnu had promised to come back as soon as she could. There were chores that needed doing and she didn't want to leave her mother alone for too long. It turned out to be just as well she left, as Taysha spent the entire day sleeping.

That evening, Bajesh prepared for the visitors that would come to give their sober congratulations and good wishes. Bajesh explained that most of the tribe would come to congratulate her personally as it had formally been Adit's celebration they participated in the night before. Because of the large numbers, she and Bajesh decided to greet people at her outdoor fire. They kept the fire in her hut going to warm tea and water to wash bowls, while bringing out the furs to sit on.

Taysha was greatly relieved by this Wedic custom because she saw it as a chance to apologize for her drunken behaviour. Still, the nervousness brought on by the bits of memories of her drunken revelry hit her the moment she had awoken.

At the sight of the first unfamiliar family's arrival at the edge of the field the nervousness turned to an out-right sickening feeling. She had calmed down by the time the third group of visitors arrived. They all assured her it was nothing that needed apologising over. "Drunken fun" was the most common phrase added to a light wobble of the head. Most of the village members admitted to, at one time or another, being the Rowdy, or spent the better part of a festival throwing up half a feast. It was evident they appreciated her gesture though. She was greatly relieved. She realized a lot of her worry was from the memories of her mother and father talking quietly in the hut, with a definite look of disgust on their faces, about certain individuals who had drunken too much fermented berry juice and made fools themselves.

This time, Taysha thought, the Wedic outlook was the more sensible one.

Now if she could just convince them to take proper baths.

Taysha was overjoyed to see Anami, his father and their family arrive.
When Bajesh told them, on her behalf, of her embarrassment over being ill-behaved, Anami's father leaned over and gave Taysha a pat on the knee to get her attention. He told her partaking of alcohol together is like the sharing of a dream. And like a dream it releases the hidden fears and angers we bury within ourselves daily. This release is good. It clears the soul. And like a dream, one can hardly be held accountable for the foolish things that sometimes happen. It is only bad, like all things in life, when it is done in excess.

Excess, he explained, is the poison of life.

It made good sense to her. Too much of anything was bad. Too much food, too much rain, too much cold or heat ... you could even love someone too much. Or hate them so much it ruins your life. Too much exercise. Too much sleep. Too much drink or smoke. Too much sex? Well, not everything fit neatly into rules ... but she figured it could be possible.

Taysha thanked him greatly for his wise words, as they helped soothed the torment in her soul. She made sure she remembered the tribal word for "wisdom".

Taysha was surprised to see Adit was the following guest.

He brought his mother, who sat quietly beside him as he gave Taysha his congratulations and basically made sure Taysha wasn't hurt too badly. Adit's mother gave the impression she would rather be somewhere else and so Adit cut his visit short.

Father, Mother and Grandmother also came out together. Grandmother was most impressed with Taysha, and constantly told Bajesh what a beautiful girl he had. Seeing the flow of guests remained even, Taysha imagined a whole line of villagers waiting their turn somewhere out of sight. For it seemed that no sooner had one group gone than another came to take their place. She was starting to wonder if she would have time for the bathroom.

After having to endure the last two groups of elderly men instructing her on Wedic customs, manners and history, she finally had genuine reason to smile.

Bahnu, Brother, Ashritha and her husband, Tapal and the group from their early morning drunken celebrations came into sight. All of them with smiles from ear to ear, and a mischievous look that held a certain suppressed excitement.

Taysha and Bajesh looked at each other with a mutual look of "Oh no" mixed with one of enjoyment.

The visitors quickly gave Taysha her best news of the day; they were the last visitors. Relieved, Taysha sat back and stretched as they gave their formal congratulations and quickly settled into a friendly conversation. They made no indication that they knew about the four of them sharing the same bed. At least if they did know, it wasn't an issue. Tapal blended with the rest of the group and was his usual witty self, but Bahnu was up and in and out of Taysha's hut as though she lived there. She even brought out extra sitting furs and bowls. Taysha was glad that she did so. It was a clear indication of their friendship, however unique.

When Taysha mentioned to Bajesh that she was glad the ceremony was finally over, Tapal was quick to jump in.

"It's not over for you though!" he said and pulled out a flask he had been hiding under his fur cloak.

On his mark, every member pulled out one they had hidden somewhere on them.

"Oooh noooo!" swooned Taysha, knowing full well what the flasks contained. She was quickly followed by a chorus of "OOoooh yeeesss!" and she felt something on her shoulder. She turned to see Bahnu who had just come out of the hut, standing over her and tapping her with a flask full of her own.

Taysha quickly discovered she was weak when it came to what Bahnu wanted. She was definitely the victor and Taysha succumbed to the offer of wine with a crooked smile. Bahnu answered with raised eyebrows and a grin.

The group spent the greater part of their time together teaching Taysha songs of their people. Songs of gods, heroes and forbidden lovers and of the beauty of their home country to the southeast, and of the Paradise to which they were all going.

Feeling the friendship, and the effects of the wine, Taysha told them the tale of the death of her mother, the destruction of her tribe, her escape, the curious wolf that had come and gone, her quest for the Great Water and up to the end of her journey when she lay down to die on the spot on where they now sat. And, of course, she told them of her rescue by the handsome, dark-skinned boy.

Bahnu sat close with her arm linked around Taysha's during the retelling of her tales. Tears were shed by the women and nods of condolences were given by the men. Wayu, one of the older ones in the group, told her that he was happy the gods had brought her to them and he hoped she would not go to die in the Dark Sea.

"It sounds like a horrible place anyway," Bahnu added.

Caught in a strange moment of being trapped in such a beautiful place, Taysha cried. Now she didn't know what she would do now. It was most distressing to feel as though she finally belonged at a time when she thought she should already have left. She admitted to the others that she felt bad for not dying or being captured with her family and friends.

"Shame on you!" Ashritha rebuked, "It is to your family's joy that you are well and most favoured by the gods."

"Yes, yes," the group chimed in as they gathered close to place a hand on her knee or shoulder.

Taysha's mouth opened to answer but all she could do is keep her eyes on her feet and cry in deep sorrow and joy. Through the countless thoughts that passed in her mind, she felt the advice of her new friends to be right, and her troubled soul was once again calmed. Seeing her sobbing less, Tapal led the others in a joyous tune to bring her out from her sadness. It was the Song of Spring. A beautiful song with separate parts for the men and women that told of life anew:

The white snow washes away the past year and old mistakes, Our troubles carried far away by the rivers.

Be happy that spring has come. Joyous! Joyous!

Take the arm of your parents, take the arm of your children,,

Take the arm of your lover and your friends.

Sing and dance. Sing and dance. All is new again.

Sing and dance. Sing and dance.. All is new again.

\- - - - -
The next morning Taysha was pleased to find they had all gone to bed at a reasonable time and that she had not drunk as much as before. She remembered everything clearly. Or clearly enough anyway.

She lay looking around her hut and saw they had all spent the night together this time. Eight people had found a place amongst her furs, all of them fully clothed this time.

Only Bajesh's cousin and her husband had once again left for their own hut, jokingly making sure Taysha would not challenge the husband to fight again.

Much better memories remained for her that morning. She slept between Bajesh and Bahnu. Bahnu had sensed her wake up and turned towards her and they kissed quietly for some time.

Taysha thought she had truly died somewhere in the mountains and she had awoken in this new life stronger, older and wiser, with the respect of an entire village. She retraced the events of first having Adit arrive at her field, to their last fight. The idea of what would have happened to her had she ever fought with one of the Amazoi boys flashed through her mind. She would have been wrenched away by one of the adults and scolded for behaviour unbecoming a young woman. Mother would have been ashamed.

Taysha was caught with a confusing feeling of being happier where she was, just outside a culture that was not her own, than amongst her own people. She suddenly understood the fight with Adit had changed her forever. What she would do from there on, she would only know when that time came. For now, it was healing the arm that Adit had twisted and then waiting for the summer to come.

She was able to put these heavy thoughts aside as everyone woke up and gradually went on their way. Wayu made sure to tell her once again how much they thanked the gods for bringing her to them.

\- - - - -
Even with her new friends, Taysha only spent time with them once in a while.

None of the girls could hunt and none of the men were willing to train. Bahnu spent a lot of time with her, which Taysha really liked. Though she did hate to return from a run to see Bajesh and Bahnu talking or laughing together. But those times were rare, and it never seemed she was interrupting anything.

From time to time, Taysha's hut was used as the general hideaway of secret or younger lovers who would ask to borrow her place for a while. Taysha, Bajesh and Bahnu would sit outside at their fire and snicker at the attempts to muffle the sounds of love coming from inside.

Tapal started to come by for awhile, seemingly to court Bahnu, but nothing came of it. She was sweet and courteous but too aloof and just out of reach for anyone to take her heart. Besides, it was apparent she now belonged to Taysha.

One day, when Bajesh and Bahnu were at the village, Adit came by on his own. He mentioned to Taysha he had been waiting for her to come visit but she hadn't. She let him know there was still an underlying feeling of unwelcome from some of the villagers, to which her friends attested.

"We all have enemies in the village! Don't worry about that. You should come live with us," Adit said most joyfully.

It sounded simple, but problems would arise such as if she and Bajesh could marry or should marry, and what would become of her hut. Mostly, the wolves would not be allowed in the village around all the geese and the sheep. And privately, she could sense Bahnu's hesitation whenever the topic of Taysha moving into the village was brought up. If she moved, she would be under the influence of the social customs of the Wedic. Out in the field, not only Taysha but her friends were free from such duties and rules. Besides, the Council had banned her from approaching. So, she stayed where she was and Adit had come to her.

It was obvious to Taysha he had timed his visit when Bajesh and Bahnu were both at the village so they could talk alone. Every once in a while their eyes would meet and they smiled knowingly.

Taysha thought it most likely over their drunken kiss.

"Oh, yeah. I was thinking," Adit said, "if you thought it a good idea, I was thinking of sending the older boys over to fight with you. Nothing like what we did, of course. Mostly wrestling, I would guess. Some staff work. It would be good experience for you and they would learn a lot from it. I've already talked to Anami. He thinks it a good idea. What do you think?"

After the idea was made clearer to Taysha she looked around her in thought.

"Every day?"

"Three days. Or five. Then one day to rest. During training time ... the village training time, I mean. I would pick one to come fight with you. You can send him back when you tire. One boy per day. Not like ten or twelve boys all at once."

"One boy per day," she repeated, hoping Adit would get her attempt at a naughty joke, but he just sat there looking at her expectantly. She felt her face flush in embarrassment.

"There are twelve men as well. Like me. Being past our first Coming of Age. So, I can send you a different-sized man every two or so circuits."

Taysha fixated on the words that were sounding far too sexual for Adit not to know what he was doing.

"I'm more than sure that some of the younger girls would also love to fight with you," Adit continued, "but I don't think it would benefit you much. You are continuing your training, yes?"

"Yes. Of course," she answered, "I like this idea very, very. I also want ask please, favour."

"Sure. Anything. What can I do?"

"Uh ... you come too and we fight. Every sirkut?"

Adit sat looking confused.

"Once every six day..." she said copying the Wedic gestures for counting on the fingers.

"Ah. Every circuit, hm?" he corrected her as he organised events in his head. "Sure. Why not. Not like before, though, yes?"

"Oh. No. Please no." She scrunched up her face and pulled on her still-healing shoulder.

"Yeah. Sorry about that," he said with a jerk of his chin up towards her shoulder.

"It's all right. Thank you. You no break this. I understand ... um, I understand if you want, you can break this. But you did not. You are good man."

"Honour." He bowed his head to her and figured it a good time to leave. Business had been settled, tea had been drunk and Bajesh and Bahnu would be along soon enough.

"Honour." She bowed back with a smile and quietly added an extra thank you.

He returned her thanks with a wobble of his head as he left. He didn't look back and Taysha sat there watching him until he was out of sight. As if woken from some trance she straightened up, inhaled deeply and looked around the forest.

" _Yeah ... great,"_ she thought, _"It seems I like him too. The stupid boy."_

Anami came by later that day to confirm the training idea with Taysha. He seemed more concerned about her beating up the boys unnecessarily than anything else. He said he or one of his senior pupils would come along with the chosen boy or young man to oversee the fight and to give instruction.

Taysha quickly figured out that meant she would constantly be learning how to fight different people of different age, body size, strength and skill.

"So, you understand?"

Taysha, her head filled with thoughts, nodded in reply.

After having been without any responsibilities for over half a year now, the sudden charge seemed strange.

"All right then," he finalised with his usual slap on his knee and stood to leave, "We'll start with young Dinesh. I think he deserves the honour of fighting you first."

"Yes. This is good choice," she said, "Must I wear top armour?" she added with a mischievous smile.

Anami's worried look quickly melted when he saw Taysha was simply playing around.

"Aahh. Yes, I would think it best," he replied with a smile.

\- - - - -
Even through the scratches and bruises that had compounded at each daily tournament with the boys and young men, Taysha always looked forward to the next day. She felt she had learned more in a month than she ever had. She also discovered her opponents were hardly comparable to Adit. This gave her the ability to try out new techniques of her own.

It wasn't really fair to the boys. For she could use what she had learned from the past fight in the next one, while each boy had to wait eleven days plus holidays to fight her again. Not to mention the fact that fighting those of similar or less weight than her now seemed most unfair. She would toss the lighter ones around just as Anami once did to her in the winter snows.

One day Anami brought one of the older girls for that training session. Her name was Kala and she was around 11 or 12 years old. It was clear the girl was an admirer of Taysha. She had shown up in a cloth and a leather piece of armour that resembled Taysha's modesty armour. She had also braided one bit of hair with a strand of leather, like the Amazoi custom for a woman with a mate. Taysha thought it was cute and never bothered to tell her the meaning behind it.

At Anami's word, the first moments of the girl's nervousness didn't stop her from suddenly leaping straight for Taysha.

It was clear to Taysha that Kala deeply enjoyed her time with her. Taysha felt that, in a way, she had become Adit and Kala had become her. She secretly enjoyed the easy wins but also took great care not to be caught with Kala's joint-locks and sturdy kick.

Taysha gave her a kind pat on her shoulder in parting, and Kala clasped her hands in front of her, "Thank you, teacher," she replied.

"Teacher?" Taysha repeated with a bit of surprise.

Anami had overheard Kala and seemed to have sanctioned the title. From then on she was greeted respectfully as Teacher by each child, and affectionately by her friends.

\- - - - -
It was clear that summer had begun.

For the first time Taysha saw the Old Field in all its glory. The dead and fallen grass, pressed down by months of snow and rain, seemed to have disappeared overnight and tall shoots of green were already as high as the men's waists. The longer periods of sun in between rains had allowed her Training Ground to harden and little tufts of grass stubbornly took hold on the battlefield as flowers of all colours sprinkled the landscape around her. The leaves had filled in the spaces between the evergreens and it felt as though she was living in a green-walled valley of her own. Birds and bees and butterflies appeared. So did the nasty mosquitoes.

Bajesh had brought an ointment to rub on the body that the mosquitoes seemed to dislike and no wonder from the way it smelled. Putting it up around the face would give Taysha a headache before the end of the day.

Taysha greatly enjoyed the times after her daily fights when she took off her thick shirt she had made especially for fighting and enjoyed the warm sun on her bare skin. She would then be free to continue training with the various Wedic weapons after the boys left, without the hindrance of a sweaty top.

Bahnu would usually arrive some time afterwards and do her daily chores of mending or making new clothes for Taysha. When she was done, she would work on the pair of Amazoi boots that Taysha still hadn't finished. On the hotter sunny days, she would sit out with her tunic pulled down to her waist in a sort of kinship with Taysha, but would pull it back up at the first signs of someone coming from the village. She even covered up if it was only Bajesh by himself. That was until Taysha scolded her for doing so. The Wedic attitude towards nudity still bothered Taysha. To see her lover scamper around for clothes after having already shared everything made her role her eyes.

She thought to cover up in front of Bajesh now just rude.

Taysha also wanted to get all her friends to join them in an Amazoi bath. She asked Bajesh for help to enlarge the pool and fire pit and to collect more rocks to heat it all.

She also came up with an idea to weave wood together in a circle that sat over the hot rocks like a sort of table. That way they could throw the rocks in any old place, put the wood piece on the water, push it down with their feet and sit directly over the heat instead of trying to keep their feet from touching the ones in the middle while their backs remained cold.

The three of them tested out their new pool one night and found it was a brilliant idea as long as at least two people were sitting on it. If all jumped out but one, the other end of the wood would start to rise and threaten to capsize the poor remaining soul. They also discovered that if they got too hot, they could all sit out on the sides and let the wooden floor float up to where they could let their legs rest straight out in front of them.

Bajesh was so impressed with Taysha's idea that he showed Father, Mother and pretty well anyone else that came by. But although equally impressed as individuals, the Wedic as a group couldn't shake free of their cultural taboos and accept Taysha's invitation to bathe with her.

Taysha knew she would never get everyone to join them sober, so she asked her friends to bring wine on a night before the Resting Day of the village. With the help of the alcohol, and Bajesh and Bahnu's open attitude about it, everyone relaxed soon enough. The pool was hardly large enough for nine people at once, and at least three people were forced to be out in the open at any given time. Taysha enjoyed watching each of them trying not to look like they were stealing glances at their friends who sat at eye level on the edge.

Much laughing and splashing occurred and eventually Wayu ended up chasing a girl around naked in the forest. He sought vengeance for the mud she had smacked on top of his head and carried her back giggling and squirming while everyone enjoyed the spectacle of the two in their most natural of states, comfortable and unashamed.

\- - - - -
The peaceful days of summer seemed to push the thoughts of the Great Water to the back of Taysha's mind.

All was well with her life, with her two lovers, her friends, her wolves, and her adopted tribe. She felt it might be a foolish thing to leave such an obvious gift from the Goddess. It had to be something like a gift. Everything was too perfect.

Perfect, until one fateful morning.

Taysha had woken with the familiar feelings of a hangover but quickly realized she had not been drinking the night before. She thought her body was playing tricks on her but the swell of nausea in her stomach convinced her to step outside quickly and find an area to crouch.

The nauseous feeling hit her strongly and she threw up but the usual relief that followed throwing up didn't come. Today was a training day and, moreover, it was Little Dinesh's day and she wouldn't do anything to miss that. She stood up and her head started to reel.

"Oh gods, what now?" she asked out loud as she turned to steady herself on the side of her hut.

"I'll just lie down a bit..." she said as she took deep breaths, "I still have time until they come."

She leaned down and pulled open the door. Instantly, the smell of her fire, furs, mosquito repellent and two wolves hit her like a kick in the ribs from Adit. She gagged and pulled back, fighting against the urge to vomit again so soon.

She calmed herself enough to call out, "Bajesh ... Bajesh!"

"Wha? What's wrong? Where are you?" he called out from inside the dark hut before crawling out on his hands still naked from his sleep.

"What's wrong?" he asked as he blinked in the light. Taysha didn't answer and she didn't look well at all. He turned to Bahnu, who sat up behind him in concern.

"Toss me my clothes."

As Bahnu started putting his clothes into his outstretched hands he caught sight of Taysha falling to one knee and he rushed out over to her.

"What's wrong? Are you sick?"

"Yeah. I don't know. Very sick."

His touch on her back felt almost violating.

Her head was swimming and she very truly thought this was Death come to take her. Why so sudden? She shook with a chill. Bajesh turned to Bahnu who now stood behind him draped in a thin sleeping cloth with his clothes and boots in hand.

"I'm going to get Father. You stay with her," he said to Bahnu as he grabbed his things and put them on as he hopped, then ran towards the village.

Bahnu crouched down and put her hand on Taysha's shoulder. As she did, a waft of her perfumed hair seemed to attack Taysha's nose.

"Oh _you_. You've found me, have you?" she addressed the gods in the Amazoi language, "Come to torment me again?"

"What?" asked Bahnu.

"Sorry. Ointment smell ... very strong. I don't understand ... why this is so." Taysha said between heavy breaths and leaned back away from her.

"All right. It's all right. I understand," Bahnu comforted her as she took a step back herself.

"What's wrong? Does it hurt?"  
"I don't know," Taysha blurted out in a way that

sounded as though she had started crying, "I feel very sick. In stomach. Oooo ... Huk!"

The talking had made her feel sicker and she dry heaved away from Bahnu.

"All right. Don't worry. Bajesh will be back soon with help," Bahnu said as she ran back into the hut and grabbed furs, an empty cooking pot and a gourd of water.

"Here, sit on this," she motioned Taysha over to the thicker fur, while being careful not to get too close.

The nausea had disappeared but she sat there shaking with her head and arms resting on her knees. The sun was still low behind the eastern mountains and though it was a clear sky above, the warmth was yet to spill into their valley.

"Can you make fire?" she asked Bahnu, nodding towards the outdoor fire pit.

"Yes, come in to the hut. It will be warmer there."

She motioned to the hut but Taysha shook her head.

"Stinks," she said plainly enough, "Sorry. Is strange."

"All right. No problem," Bahnu assured, "I just hope you're not pregnant."

"What means 'plegnant'?" Taysha asked, while keeping her head up in the air and away from the smells.  
"What does pregnant mean?" Bahnu corrected.

"Yes. What does plegnant mean?"

"Uh ... pregnant ... um,"

Bahnu's thoughts were distracted between getting water and flint and her own clothes, "Uh ... to be with child? No? To have a baby in your tummy?"

Bahnu was so sweet the way she talked that Taysha had to smile but her smile quickly faded when the meaning of the words hit her.

"What? You say, baby?"

"Yes. In the tummy," Bahnu replied with an added pat on her stomach.

Taysha looked back up to the sky and breathed through her mouth, again wrestling with the sickening feeling.

"Gods be damned..." she cursed without the strength to move her lips as she did so.

Bahnu now realized she may be right about Taysha's condition but she bit her lip and concentrated on the fire.

Bajesh eventually arrived with Father and Anami.

They came sprinting up to her and she appreciated their concern but she would have appreciated it more if the smelly men would sit back a bit. After Bajesh answered the expected series of questions, Anami dropped down on his backside and looked at Father with raised eyebrows, "Maybe ... you should go get your wife," he suggested in a telltale fashion.

"Yeah. I was just thinking what you are thinking."

Taysha could see the hidden meaning in their looks.

"Oh no." Taysha shook her head at the sky, "Everyone come and worry and..." she let her words drift. If she was pregnant, there would be no way to stop the onrush of clamouring women now.

"I am die..." moaned Taysha.

"You're not going to die," Father asserted as he stood up.

"Don't want pleg'nant. Don't want baby," she called out.

"Well, that's not something within our control," Father retorted, "I'm getting Mother."

Taysha swayed in her frustration.

"Aaaagh," she yelled at the ground, at the gods, at the sickness... at her stupid self.

Anami gave her an understanding pat on her back.

Father brought Mother to find Taysha hunched over one of the benches with Bahnu holding the fur on her back.

"What do you feel?" Mother asked.

"Feel bad," Taysha replied, her eyes pleading for Mother to make it stop, "But little better now."

"She said everything stinks this morning," added Bahnu.

"Ahhh," Mother leaned back as she considered her diagnosis, "Headache? Fever?"

"No. But always throwing up," Taysha replied, "Talk. Throw up. Smell. Throw up. Drink water ... throw up. I am dying. Father says no, but is true."

Mother gave a little laugh before looking over to her son, now a man, sitting across from her.

"No, precious girl, you're not dying. Something much better, I think."

"Oh no..." mumbled Taysha, swaying back and forth over the bench. "No baby, please. Make to go away."

Mother let out a little burst of laughter.

"Well, I understand how you feel, but..."

"I feel? I feel sick," Taysha cut into Mother's speech with her typical humour.

"It's not for sure, though. Maybe you ate something bad."

"Yes. Maybe so," replied Taysha feeling a hopeful.

"When was your period?" Mother asked plainly.

"Is missing," she answered.

"Missing? You mean it's late?" Mother responded.

Bajesh rolled his eyes into his head.

"Of course that's what she meant, Mother. Don't drag this out longer than necessary."

Mother ignored the comment and looked at Taysha.

"Yes," groaned Taysha, "'My language, we say _missing._ "

"I see," said Mother, "That makes sense. How long now?"

"Two month. But Ashritha say is because I am hard training. She also have this when she is training before. So..."

"Well, yes..." Mother agreed, "It does happen... but two months is kind of long."

"Three now," Taysha admitted, "If no soon, then three."

"Well, that doesn't sound quite right to me but we're all different..." Mother's voice trailed off as she sat up and shared silent, but concerned, looks with the two men. Anami sat shaking his head at the thought Taysha had been training up till the day before.

"Well then," he finally said to Taysha, "No more training for you then."

"No..." Taysha begged, "No want stop training. No want food. No want water ... baby ... all this is no thank you."

"All right. All right." Mother gave her back a couple of light rubs, "I'll go bring some things that will help you feel better IF you're pregnant, which I think you are. But in case it's just some bad food, I'll bring something for that too and the smell, right? I couldn't sleep in the hut at night when I was pregnant. The smell of the fire bothered me especially."

"Yes. Yes." Taysha turned towards her pleadingly, "Very, very stinky at morning. But, now not so much."

"Well in either case, you're all right. I'll be back soon."

"Mom. No spreading this around, all right?" pleaded Bajesh as she walked by him.

"Don't be silly," was her only response as she marched on. Father reached over and gave his boy's leg a squeeze in support.

Over the next couple of days it became pretty clear Taysha was pregnant. Bajesh made her a simple, open shelter, to get her away from the smells. It was propped up just above crouching height on one of the poles of her training ground. There she could sit on the bench and be within reach of the fire.

At first, the wolves sat by her feet looking concerned mostly because when they came near her face she'd push the stinky animals away. Eventually they were re-leashed to sleep just outside of her reach and Taysha's range of smell.

One day she lay there as Mother and a group of concerned visitors stood discussing how she should come to the village to stay. The suggestion was followed by a constant exchange of theories and rebuttals of possible arguments that echoed around and around in Taysha's head until she snapped.

"No! I staying here. Be quiet! Go away."

Bajesh and his brother smirked in amusement of her rudeness towards Mother and the other elders.

Taysha ignored the looks of the group as she sat nibbling on dry bread crackers and held a cup of wine that Mother had brought for her morning sickness. The women quietly left her alone and Mother offered her their understanding. All the women had experienced morning sickness, but for some reason it was hitting Taysha harder than anyone else.

Mother suggested her hard training as the cause.

After all, there were reasons why women didn't train after puberty. What else would it be?

Taysha didn't know, but she refused to think her training had anything to do with it.

It was the gods.

That was what it was.

It wasn't just the gods that fought against her mind. The more people did things for her, the more she wished they would leave her alone. She had to almost forcefully stop herself from thinking bad things about Bajesh and Bahnu who stayed with her constantly.

She had plenty of others to direct her frustrations at.

When she finally started feeling better, she asked for Little Dinesh so she could apologize for missing their fight day.

"Don't worry," she said to an obviously disappointed Dinesh sitting in front of her, "After baby, we can fight again."

"No," he said solemnly, "After you have your baby you'll be a New Adult and won't play with us any more."

She balanced out which part of that last comment she would handle first.

Either the hint was that she was just becoming an adult or that she was playing. She knew the word "play" was used in a variety of ways by the Wedic. Unlike in her language, the Wedic used it for drinking and sex as well, so she let that go for now. But telling a woman past her 15th winter that she was a child was another matter. She had been a woman for over three winters now.

"Hey. My tribe. Amazoi. Hair here..." she said pointing to her crotch "...then not child. You have hair?"

He shyly shoot his head, "No."

"Then _you_ are child still," she continued. "I am adult 1, 2 , 3 now four years. All right?"

He mutely nodded before asking, "But you have no children, no?"

"Me? No. No baby."

"In my tribe, we have First Adulthood. That's when you get hair down there. The Second Adulthood is when you have your first child ... you understand?"

It suddenly made a lot of confusing things she had heard people say more understandable. Especially how some of them who were younger were treated like elders by their peers. For the Wedic, having a child brought a person to their second adulthood regardless of their age. Now she understood.

"Yes. I understand," she answered, "Now I say to you again. After baby, we practice. You believe me?"

He smiled and nodded.

"I can't hear you," she mimicked Anami when coaxing the children through training.

"Yes Teacher~!" he yelled.

"All right. Now go. You are too loud for me."

She shooed him away in good humour.

He stood up but instead of leaving, he stepped forward and kissed her on the forehead before running all the way back through the village to the Wedic Training Grounds where he leaped and kicked and punched in bliss.

\- - - - -
Mother had come up on one of her daily visits to find Taysha practising her staff moves.

"Taysha!" she yelled as she hurried towards her, "Stop that! Right now!"

Taysha looked over to Bahnu sitting in her usual place pulling up her top with a surprised look on her face.

"What? Me?" Taysha called back.

"Yes. You! What are you doing?"

Taysha looked down at the spear in her hand like every child in the world who had been asked that most confusing question.

"What am I...?" she started, while saying what she really thought in her head.

" _What does it look like I'm doing, Silly woman."_

"You can't do that," Mother scolded, "You can't do anything for a while."

"There no baby yet." Taysha joyfully patted her still flat stomach to help ease the situation.

"Not to see or feel, but you must trust me Taysha. There is a small baby inside you. You can't go about climbing trees or running up mountains or fighting boys any more."

Mother saw Taysha's hardening expression and realized that she had said things too strongly. She followed up in a soothing voice, "At least for a while, all right? Will you trust me? When the belly is a big bump, you can to do some strenuous things again."

"This is 'belly?'" was Taysha's only response as Mother took the spear from her.

"And you," Mother redirected the remnants of her shock and anger at Bahnu, "You should know better than that!"

The comment and sternness of Mother's voice sparked instant anger in Taysha.

"Hey!" she called out to Mother. Her voice was deep and reached out like the calling voice of an angry man.

Mother jumped at the sudden noise and saw the face she had not seen since Taysha's fight with Adit.

"Why you say this to her?" Taysha asked aggressively while throwing her chin up at her, "She _must_ know because I am stupid barb'rian girl? She do nothing wrong."

Mother forced a nervous smile at this sudden and openly hostile attack. She was glad to be holding the spear but she had no doubt about Taysha's ability to take it from her if she so chose.

"No. No. Nothing like that..." she lost her argument as she herself realized her blunder.

"You apologize her!" Taysha's voice rose as she stuck her finger straight out at Mother's face. The clear insult brought Mother's pride to the surface and she hesitated, time that would have been better spent finding words to sooth the situation.

"You apologize!" Taysha almost yelled as she stepped forward at seeing Mother's lack of willingness to do so. "Or, I BREAK YOU NECK!"

The threat was yelled into her face as Taysha clenched her hand into a fist in front of her.

Bahnu quickly stood in panic, "It's all right. It's all right," she pleaded, "I should have known. Really ... I should have told you. It's my fault."

She ran forward and grabbed hold of Taysha's arm in an attempt to lower it.

The fear had struck Mother straight down to the small of her back and she could feel her legs start to shake. She thought of running but imagined Taysha on her back as Adit had been on hers during the fight, and figured it best to calm her enough so she could at least walk away. There were more ways to fight than with fist and foot.

Taysha's heart pounded as she stood waiting to see what Mother would do. She knew she had stepped into the deep of the river. She felt the spiralling effect of the destruction of all that had been built crashing to the ground. She would lose support from Father and most of the tribe now. Maybe no one would ever come again. She would be limited to what she and the other two could gather themselves, that was if Bajesh and Bahnu even stayed with her after this. It struck her as funny that the first thing she thought of was she wouldn't get any more eggs.

She loved eggs.

Yet, something inside her kept Taysha from caring about it all too deeply. She had secretly been expecting this from the first time she had met the strong-willed woman.
There was no doubt in Taysha's mind that the first thing Mother would do is go back to the village and raise opposition against her. But before that, Taysha would get a very, very good apology or Mother would be beaten mercilessly until she did.

"I'm sorry Taysha ... Bahnu," Mother finally spoke with a quiver in her voice that Taysha tried not to enjoy, "I was just very shocked. And I was scared. You must understand that's my first grandchild you're carrying."

Now it was Taysha who stood in a state of shock. Her mouth hung half open as if reforming a now unusable thought. The understanding of what Mother had said started her eyes watering. It had never crossed her mind. In fact, up until that very moment she had still been hoping it had been days of food poisoning. She was carrying her mother's grandchild. How she missed her mother. She lessened the tension in her arm against Bahnu's and let it fall to her side.

"No one insult Bahnu," she said through her trembling lip and the first falling tear, "Bajesh can fight. I can fight. Bahnu no can fight. All right? She is good girl."

"Yes. Yes," Mother agreed instantly, "I am truly sorry. I would normally never say anything like that. I was just so shocked."

"I'm sorry," Taysha said and looked down at her feet. "I no break you neck, really. I am very bad to say so," she said quietly as tears started dropping to the ground.

Mother's eyes welled and she held her hand up to stop her quivering lips.

"Oh, dear girl. You're not. You're not. I am so proud you are my son's woman ... so proud." Mother stepped closer and pulled her close, "It's all so hard when you are pregnant. More than anyone can imagine. But there is one thing you can enjoy – constant pampering."

Taysha looked up and wiped her eyes as her new mother explained pampering. No one outside the three standing there ever heard about what took place that day. And Taysha never again doubted the love of her New Mother.

\- - - - -
Taysha sat feeling her growing stomach one morning. It was the day she sat thinking it could actually be Tapal's child.

What a mess that would create.

She didn't remember actually having sex with him and she didn't want to ask Bajesh. It was better that subject not be opened between them. She asked Bahnu who was completely mortified she was being forced to talk about the subject.

"You must tell me, Bahnu. This too much important. More important than embarrassed."

"You're right," Bahnu finally conceded, "All right. From what I can remember ... you two had coupled, yes. While ... oh, gods! This is so difficult! Well, while Bajesh and I ... you know. Anyway. Oh gods ... this isn't easy. Right. Somewhere during the whole night, I was, you know ... licking Tapal's ... you know what ... and you were ... uh, down there ... licking me. And it was like you saw what I was doing and you came up. And we were, like, licking and sucking ... you know? Oh gods ... anyway, you kind of took control and were like crazy on him ... and he ... uh, finished? Um ... in your mouth."

Bahnu buried her face in her hands in embarrassment. "Oh gods! Please understand that, I am not explaining any more details, all right?"

"I understand. Thank you," Taysha answered and sat back relieved.

Bahnu looked up at her concerned, "He did enter you after that though," she whispered, "I hear it can still happen. That you can get pregnant that way. So, it is possible..."

Bahnu looked down and shook her head, "Enough of that topic. Fun to do, not fun to talk about."

So in the end, it wasn't any clearer who the father was, but Taysha figured the laws of averages were more in her favour.

The father was Bajesh, and there was nothing more she needed to think about.

\- - - - -
That fall, the village Council had decided it was time to deal with the stagnant marsh that was in the West Clearing past the Training Grounds. This is what Taysha's river emptied into and it held a steady supply of mosquitoes all summer. With mosquito season over, it was time to deal with the problem once and for all.

It was a lot of work and it required every man in the village in order to get it done before the winter. A knee-high canal was to be dug and lined with rocks to avoid it filling back up with mire. That would be half the work. The earth that was taken from the trenches would be used to fill in as much of the swamp as possible. The planners had hoped it would be finished before the first snow.

They started with the far end of the proposed trench and working backwards. It was far enough from the village that some of the men chose to camp where they were digging rather than hike through the rough forest at night only to march back again the next morning. Among them was Bajesh. His daily trip would have been twice as far as the others. Though constantly worried about Taysha he reluctantly stayed the nights. Mostly his worry was of those men who returned to the village at night.

Of course she was a warrior, and pregnant, but she was beautiful and she wouldn't be pregnant forever.

He knew it was a stupid fear, but he slept little the first two nights. There was something that kept nagging at his mind.

In the late afternoon of the third day, he was to discover what the quiet voice was trying to say.

The muddy and sweaty men working on the trench had just sat down for pine-needle tea and honey-sweetened biscuits, when a young boy from the village suddenly appeared on an outcrop above their heads and screamed down at them:

"A BEAR! A bear attacked Taysha!"

He then fell to his knees panting.

Bajesh had no recollection of his run up the gully and into the large open field to the west of the village. He did remember men running with him and past him as they raced on towards the unimaginable scene.

Bajesh's lungs burned by the time he was half way across the field. He started crying from thinking he couldn't run the whole distance and imagining what condition Taysha lay in. A gentle push from his big brother and a look that told him to "be a man" carried him onwards. On through the pain he ran, though his heart felt too heavy to carry.

He made it up past the Training Grounds and into the cool grove of his village. A lot of the men who had run past him were still there catching their breath and sharing water from the drinking ladles the women had brought out. Word was passed around that most of those who had not been out digging were already at Taysha's hut. Bajesh ignored all of this and kept running through the village, when he saw something that made him want to scream and hit the woman.

She was wearing a smile.

The woman ran to him, smiling, with a water ladle. Her expression confused Bajesh enough to stop and he stood resting with his hands on his knees, wanting three good breaths before he hit her and carried on.

"She killed a bear!" she said before she even got to him.

Sweat dripped off Bajesh's brow as he looked up at her and then around at the others in the village.

"That's what the boys say," said one of the older men, added between heavy breaths, "Most of the village is up with her. We'd better get up there, too."

As if they were leaves blown by the same wind, the group of men leaned forward into the first step of the run to Taysha's camp.

"Is she all right?" Bajesh directed his question to the girl who had brought him the water.

"Fine. I mean ... really fine," she yelled after him, "Not a scratch. Unbelievable!"

Bajesh felt his legs give way as if he had taken too much of the Smoke. Tears ran in streams from his face at the relief as he followed the others running into the eastern forest. His lungs burned and he could feel his legs shake while he ran. Still, Bajesh sporadically giggled at relief at knowing that Taysha was safe.

His first view of Taysha was her standing outside the hut, pointing to the ground and talking to those who had gathered.

She indeed looked fine. Relieved, Bajesh slowed to a walk and Brother put his arm around him.

The eastern side of Taysha's hut roof was pulled over on an angle towards the entrance. Bajesh could see the heads of most of the villagers standing in her training area with their backs to him, looking down.

Someone called out, "Here comes Bajesh!"

Everyone spun around and opened a path for him and his brother. The sight that greeted them was the biggest black bear most had ever seen. It was larger than a man and much, much heavier, lying face down in a pool of blood.

Bajesh pulled his eyes away from the bear to look at Taysha. She stood holding her belly with Mother and Bahnu by her side. She stepped up to him and they embraced.

Bajesh could feel her shaking as he held her. Then he felt he should sit down before he ironically fell on this girl -who had just killed a bear- and hurt her.

With the reunion of the two young lovers, the whispers and murmurings broke out into excited talking. Bahnu got a gourd of cool water for Bajesh and Father came over from looking at the hut roof.

In consideration of the event, the digging was cancelled for the day and Taysha and Bahnu had time to explain what had taken place.

\- - - - -
It was early in the morning when Taysha and Bahnu had been woken by Ushi snarling.

Wada suddenly pulled back on the rope that kept her leashed too close to the door for comfort. Neither Taysha nor Bahnu knew exactly how to react to the unexpected behaviour. That was until they heard the loud "Snoff!" of a harsh breath just outside.

The two were up and dressed just in time to see a black paw, with claws as long as a man's fingers, break open half the door like it was made of sticks. It was hastily withdrawn at the snap of Ushi's jaws. From where Ushi was, he saw more of the invading beast than anyone else and he was not about to be cornered in the hut if it decided it wanted to come in.

Ushi started pulling back on his leash so intensely, Taysha thought if he didn't pull down the shaking hut, he would choke himself to death. She instinctively drew the small knife by her pillow and practically fell onto the cord as she cut it.

Ushi was outside before she could blink.

Taysha turned her back to the half broken door and cut Wada loose. The stupid wolf practically ran over top her mistress to get to her brother.

Taysha crawled over and looked out to see where Wada and Ushi went. There, standing behind them, seemingly assessing the situation, swayed the black bear. It was not running. Although cautious, it had no real fear of the young wolves. Especially not these two spring cubs, which probably hadn't brought down anything bigger than a rabbit in their lives.

He seemed to know.

And it also seemed the initial shock of having his paw snapped at was wearing off and the bear composed himself. He swayed back and forth and took a swipe at the loud, annoying animals. Ushi crouched back out of the way in an uncertain mixture of wanting to fight and wanting to escape. Wada lunged forward at the huge beast in an attempt to defend her brother.

All this happened in the time it took for Taysha to blink twice. She leaned back and grabbed for the knife that she had dropped and scrambled out side.

Then the bear, standing three heads higher than Taysha, turned and made a gurgling noise.

It was like no sound Taysha had ever heard before. It sounded more fitting for an animal like a goose. But the message was clear enough. The beast looked straight in her eyes as he bared his teeth and made a lunge towards her. The unexpected quickness of the large animal and the intensity of the instant fear had her feet running before she could tell herself what to do. There was no doubt in her mind it would have caught her if it hadn't been for Wada's jump in at the bear's hind quarters. From the corner of her eye, she saw the bear turn to give chase to Wada, but stopped as soon as Ushi showed signs of readying his attack from the rear.

Taysha's body took her around Ushi to where Wada was now actually sitting on her haunches. The look of fear mixed with not knowing what to do was evident in the wolf's eyes.

Taysha turned just in time to see Bahnu's head disappear back into the hut. Suddenly, she became the bear's new target.

Bahnu's screams gave Taysha the chills as she watched the huge animal rear up and pounce onto the hut's roof. Father's work held firm, but it was evident the structure couldn't take more than a few of such attacks.

"Give me SPEAR! GIVE ME SPEAR, Bahnu!!" Taysha yelled as she positioned herself behind the bear and in line with the hut door, "BAHNU!! SPEAR! SPEAR!"

All the while Bahnu screamed and screamed.

The roof was starting to collapse. Taysha went down on one knee hoping to see Bahnu try to throw out her spear through the bear's legs. Ushi jumped in and bit at the bear's hind leg. The over-confident bear was now to begin its lesson on the horrors of fighting a pack. Ushi, seeing the bear turning to attack him, leaped away in the opposite direction of Wada. When the bear followed, Wada lurched in to bite.

Taysha was so relieved to see them fight with her, to fight for her, that she blurted out a sob. What she wasn't pleased about was her girlfriend's lack of knowledge of all things important. The moment the bear turned and started to chase Wada to the edge of the field, Taysha sprinted into her hut. Bahnu screamed again as Taysha suddenly appeared.

"The spear!"

Bahnu mutely pointed beside Taysha in reply.

"THAT'S DAMN JAVELIN!" Taysha yelled back over the baying of her wolves. "That is spear! That!"

She pointed to the weapon just behind Bahnu.

"Hurry!" Taysha screamed at her.

Bahnu was now handing her the spear with the butt-end facing the entrance. The only thing that went through Taysha's mind was a long slew of curses as she popped her head out of the hut to see where the bear was. It was caught in a sort of tug-of-war between Ushi and Wada. This was good and bad. It kept the bear from focusing on the hut but it also prevented it from leaving. That meant her only option was to get out while it was still far enough from the entrance and kill it.

"Damn, stupid girl," Taysha cursed Bahnu, as she stepped out and pulled the staff through her hands so the weapon was facing the right way.

Spear in hand, she ran to help her fighting companions. The bear had its hands full with the two relentless canines but it had time to give a menacing glare at Taysha as if to tell her he would take care of her later.

There was no need to assess the situation further. The decision was made before she had taken the first step. Her feet planted firmly on the earth, she levelled her spear and plunged it into the bear's neck before it knew what had happened. As she pulled the spear out, blood poured from its neck like a river. Taysha had never seen that much blood before. The bear turned slowly and deliberately to concentrate on her rather than the wolves. She had never been as scared as that instant, even in the Hoorg attack. But she remembered her training and stepped back sturdily to maintain the spear striking distance as the bear tried to close in on her.

Again, she thrust into its neck. This time the bear was watching and swiped at the attacking weapon. But Taysha's level of ability and experience held true, and she withdrew the spear before the bear could hit it. Ushi grabbed onto its rear leg and Wada continued yelping from the side, looking for her chance to attack.

It seemed the second strike had hit the animal in the windpipe and it stopped to try and draw a clear breath. The hole in its neck and the unearthly sounds mixed with the flowing blood sent Taysha into a moment of panic.

She spun her spear around like a club to hit it over the back of its exposed neck. The strength of the bear and Taysha's panicked condition meant the blow was more of an annoyance to both of them. She struck again at the beast's head with the metal edge, but it only bounced off its skull.

Taysha collected her wits as she spun the spear around so that the metal tip pointed straight down at the ground and she stepped in dangerously close to the dying animal as a gamble in strategy.

She pulled her arms up over her head and thrust the spear down into the back of its neck. Through the wood staff, she could feel the iron tip cut its way though the muscle and bone.

A final bloody gasp carried the bear's soul back to the Beginning.

Taysha released the tension from her belly and left the spear stuck in the bear as she stepped back with her hands on the small of her back, looking into the sky.

"Bahnu, I not feel so well. Go find Mother. All right?" she asked between quick breaths.

As Bahnu put on her boots, Ushi and Wada sniffed around cautiously and licked up some of the blood. Ushi took a couple of bites from the leg, but seemed to find it a lot more work than the food his mistress gave him.

Taysha didn't want to get her spear. She had this feeling the bear would spring to life and bite her. So she walked around to the bench at her training grounds and there she sat with one eye on the beast.

"Bahnu," Taysha said sternly as the girls started to leave, "You start training the martial arts tomorrow."

Bahnu ran off without a word and Taysha cupped her belly in her hands. She promised herself that she would teach her child to fight, regardless of what gender was found between its legs.

Until then, Bahnu would be her first pupil.

\- - - - -
Bajesh was initially relieved of his duties of digging the trench so he could help repair Taysha's hut and prepare the bear meat. After he and some of the men had dragged the bear near Taysha's bathing river, it took them two days to gut, skin, clean, and ready the meat and fur.

Taysha came by to watch and told Bajesh to make sure every Wedic family got some meat. It was now her turn to give something back.

Having memories of eating mostly smoked wolf all winter, Taysha was perfectly happy to make sure the village took most of the meat in exchange for the fish, boar, rabbit, deer, geese and eggs they had given her. Although she wished she could avoid giving any to those who even now opposed her, she felt it may be a clever move on her part to do so anyway. She tried to give Father the fur in payback for the one he had given her for her hut door but he insisted she keep it. It became another trophy of her ability and a great source of pride for her.

Bajesh's freedom from digging lasted three days before he returned for duty. The truth was, he did it to get away from Taysha and Bahnu's training. For true to her word, Taysha started training Bahnu the day after the bear attack.

Taysha may have earned her place as a warrior and hunter even among the men, but as a teacher of her lovers, she had more to learn. Almost from the start, Bahnu endured her lessons with dirty tears on her face. She was quite embarrassed about having to be put through the disgrace of manly work. She was a girl after all. At any rate, she wasn't like Taysha and her tribe. Women of the Wedic weren't expected to know these things.

Bajesh had returned one evening to the sight of Bahnu sitting on the ground with a full-bellied Taysha kicking her in the side of the leg until she got up. He decided it best to just leave them to their own affairs, but that night at dinner, he could endure it no longer.

Bajesh coughed lightly, while keeping his eyes on his stew.

"I was wondering if it's necessary to have Bahnu do the martial arts. I mean, I don't even do it any more."
The cracking of the fire seemed to grow louder as Taysha turned her head and looked out of the open door in silence. After a moment, when Bajesh gave Bahnu a smile of assurance, Taysha turned to him.

"I cannot explain your language. Stupid language too difficult!" she sputtered in obvious frustration and pointed to Bahnu, "She and me. Only? With no wolves? We are dead. Dead! Taysha, Bahnu, baby. All gone."

Bahnu started to cry silently again. Taysha looked over at her and then back at Bajesh.

"See? Now she cry. Cry and screaming. This is all she know. Why?" Taysha inquired, "Because this is what is teaching to her. Wedic... great people. Great knowing art of fighting, but then say, 'Oh you are woman now. Don't worry. You only do one thing now.' This is stupid practice."

In the silence she pointed outside with outstretched palm towards the female wolf lying on her back wrestling with Ushi.

"Even Wada know to fight. Wada is help and save us. She is girl too. But she no crying and screaming!"

Taysha cocked her head to the side as if to collect her thoughts and started again,

"If Wada only looking, looking-looking," she made the familiar face when trying to remember a word, "what do you say lookiiiiinng? Looking hard?" she emphasized to Bajesh with wide-open eyes.

"Staring," he replied.

"Yes, _staring_. If Wada only staring at bear, then Ushi is now dead. Only because she fight and bite ... this is why Ushi alive now. Ushi alive because of girl wolf."

They could both see her point, but . . .

"The chances of that ever happening again are pretty small," Bajesh offered.

The comment seemed to wipe Taysha's mind clean and she looked at him with a furrowed brow.

" _Is he that stupid? Really. The only thing that saved us ... that finished the attack ... was me. And the only reason I didn't stay in the hut screaming with Bahnu is because I've trained. He can't see that? Stupid cock. I should kick him right in the face."_
"It's like the wolf attack, " Bajesh continued, "Afterwards I wouldn't leave my hut without my spear, but now I don't carry it. It was a shock..."

Taysha was no longer wanting to formulate words or indulge in a Wedic debate.

"Simple." she said with her hand outstretched towards him, "She study or she leave," she stated before turning to Bahnu, "If I die, no ... I mean _died_. If I died from bear. How do you feel? I think, not so good. So I teach you be like Wada. You will be strong like Wada. Now, boo hoo hoo. Fine. But I not be like stupid boy and say to you, _'Oooooh, Are you all right? Poor girl. You should not work so.'_ I will kick you, like Anami do for me. And you will stand. And you will stronger. Like Wada. She not strong like Ushi. But, she is strong enough. You train... or go to Mama. Cry there."

Taysha sat with her bowl of stew and looked at Bahnu until she replied.

"Yes."

"Yes? What yes? Stay and train or go to home? Other home. Mother's home," she corrected herself quickly, not wanting Bahnu to think this was not her home. Taysha loved Bahnu greatly but there were too many chances that had saved them from the bear that wouldn't be present again. She had already been attacked by two animals in a year. Only the gods knew what they planned next.

"Stay and train."

"Good. I like you. Don't want you go to Mother's. She is kind, but cannot fight bears."

Taysha took a sip of her stew and added,

"I am not so kind... but I can fight bears."

\- - - - -
The rest of the autumn passed by quietly and routinely. The trenches had been dug and the stagnant water had drained out into the far valley. A little over half the swampy ground had been filled in with dirt and rocks and it looked as though it would decrease the number of mosquitoes next year.

Over a drunken night of straight-forward talk with Anami, Taysha had scolded the Wedic people for putting aside their impressive skills at certain ages. She was happy to hear he whole-heartedly agreed. He said some of the husbands had made shortened bows and arrows for their wives. But, the women used their new toys with great amusement for one or two days, after which they hung their weapons inside their huts.

But even in their alcohol-fuelled energy, Taysha could not talk Anami into training the people in case of an attack.

"They just won't do it, Taysha," he said, "Not until some threat is found next door."

"This is when already too late." was her reply.

Taysha asked Father to make a suit of modesty armour for Bahnu, which he did and Taysha thought she looked cute enough to eat in it. Although still about the same skill level as when she had started over one month before, her waist had tightened and her shoulders had broadened. Bahnu said her mother told her that she looked like a boy, but it was clear Bahnu secretly enjoyed looking more like Taysha.

Taysha's bear fur had been stretched, cured and softened and it sat rolled in the corner of her hut waiting for winter. There Taysha sat most of her days, thinking her pregnancy would never end as her belly just kept getting bigger. Mother told her she was smaller than some pregnancies but Taysha had never seen herself look like that before. Although the thought of pushing that lump out of her Womanly Entrance was enough to make her almost physically sick with nervousness, she was really looking forward to getting it over with.

" _The first thing I'll do,"_ she promised herself, _"is run up to the mountain pass again."_

"Oh no," she moaned as she realized the baby would probably be born in the winter. That meant a cold, wet, difficult climb. Still, it was better than sitting around, doing nothing.

The thought of her child being born in the winter led her to thinking how the Wedic calculated time.

Bajesh said Taysha had been there one _year_ , which was the accumulation of four seasons. That was easy enough but it hardly captured how she felt. By the Amazoi method, this was to be her second winter she had _survived_ with the Wedic and her sixteenth winter in this world. She also realized that when her child was born, she would be older than her mother was when she had given birth to Taysha.

Her frustrations at daily chores and the lack of training grew as the days grew colder. To add to things, Bajesh had stopped having sex with her by the end of summer. He said it just didn't feel right with her being pregnant. One day when Mother came up to visit and make stew, Taysha openly asked her about it. Mother said not to worry. She said most men do little funny things during the first pregnancy. She told Taysha that Father wouldn't look directly at her belly or touch it when she was pregnant with Brother. Mother knew Taysha really didn't have anyone else to talk to but it was a difficult subject to discuss with her son's lover.

"I guess you'll just have to wait, or do it yourself," she advised with a bashful smile and returned to preparing the meal.

Bahnu, who was sitting with them, remained silent throughout the conversation, but Taysha could tell she wasn't happy. Taysha could guess why. Over the last few months, the two of them had secret love-making sessions when Bajesh was in the village to release each other. Bahnu probably wasn't too happy to hear Taysha felt unsatisfied. But there was just a different feeling being with a man than with a woman.

Taysha couldn't help it. It's just the way she felt.

Still, something changed between the two of them and their encounters became fewer. It was as if all three of them were just waiting for the birth so they could get back to their lives.

\- - - - -
The first snowfall came early and sent the village into a dither of preparations. The surprise it caused was quite understandable seeing there were still leaves on the trees at the time. Regardless of the calendar, a feast for the harvesting of their small patch of fall vegetables was announced.

Though a little colder and wetter than the other feasts Taysha had been at, it showed her she was now an accepted part of the Wedic tribe. Just like the others, she had her share of so-called enemies but the majority welcomed her and took care of her. This was proven mostly when halfway through a bowl of vegetable soup, she had to sit back from the constant pains and all festivities came to a halt. She was quickly surrounded by a large group, chattering on about what they should do. The seriousness in their voices gave Taysha the idea she was close to giving birth. Even her stern commands to be left alone hadn't the strength they usually had.

From that night on, she stayed in Bajesh's parents hut along with Bajesh, his grandmother and Brother. For the first time, she saw there was no hesitation by his family members to dress and undress in front of each other. When she mentioned this, Mother said, "We're family. We have seen each other naked from the time we were born. Although Bajesh's grandmother is not my mother, when we are married, she became my mother. Just as a husband and wife become brother and sister."

"Why this just in family. Not whole tribe? Tribe is not family too?" asked Taysha.

Almost simultaneously, everyone except Grandmother snorted out a laugh.

"Nooooo." Brother summarised everyone's feelings with a sturdy shake of his head.

"The tribe is the tribe," Bajesh added as he readied the bed, "and family is family."

Everyone in the hut settled in as Grandmother spoke.

"The Wedic are from many tribes. We came from the south of the Great East in great numbers. We walked for years and years. Many returned. Some continued to the west. But we of common thought remained. We are the ones who ended our days of wandering. Some are from the same family, true ... such as those of Anami's family ... yet others can speak in words even I do not understand. But we are together as one.
That is the meaning of " _we-dik,_ ", you see? One Thought. We are united not by blood but by our hearts. And we believe it's a nobler thing."

"Yeah," added Brother with a laugh, "That means there is always someone here to disagree with you."

"Sh," Mother said quickly, "Speak quietly."

Brother just burped and lay back down.

The concept surprised Taysha. She hadn't realized everyone in the tribe was so different. It certainly explained the constant debates and Council meetings. For the Amazoi, as far as she could tell, everyone was related to everyone else. Cousins, sisters, brothers ... as far back as the origins of her people, for all she knew. She knew nothing about the origins beyond the songs and poems about being born from dew on the grass or from the earth or from who-knows-what else?

She came to envy the Wedic. They knew actual accounts of actual people from actual events. Yes, they had their gods and their stories of the Beginning and the End. But the stories weren't mixed in with their true past, something Taysha promised herself she would never do. She would never tell her child she was saved by a wolf of gold and taken away to safety by a bird of fire or something equally ridiculous. Taysha, like the Wedic, would tell her child all that had happened. She would talk about all the good times and all the awkward and bad times so her experience would help her children's walk through life.

During her stay in the village, Bajesh went to take care of the wolves. At first they were given a longer leash to move about but he found them the next morning tangled up around the benches and training posts. After the third night of Taysha's absence, they started howling for her. One night was so bad she waddled out to them to tell them to be quiet. No one in the tribe wanted them in the village and her suggestion of letting them loose impressed the people even less.

It was finally decided that Bajesh would spend the nights with them at Taysha's hut, just to keep them quiet. After that, Taysha had constant bad dreams about the wolves eating him, or worse, Bahnu going to ... well, eat him.

She had frequent nightmares now, and somehow they all ended with someone being eaten.

Her daytime fears grew as well with the absence of both her lovers. She couldn't stop thinking Bajesh and Bahnu felt closer than they let on and were meeting at her hut. It was almost funny for her to think she was fine with all three of them making love together but the thought of the two of them alone sent her almost mad with jealousy. It was the thought of being left out, especially with Bahnu being so beautiful and the opposite of Taysha in terms of character. What Taysha lacked, Bahnu possessed. She was enduring, patient, quiet, polite, cheerful, gentle and careful with her words.

In a moment of panic, Taysha even asked that Bahnu stay with her in Bajesh's hut. It was a request quickly denied. The situation was made worse every time Taysha saw Bahnu and Bajesh talking together. Taysha knew it was just the voices of the gods that tormented her but it was fuel for the fire. This would be the last stupid baby she ever had.

When the time came, she was calmer than she expected. Her water had broken early that morning in Bajesh's sleeping-furs, making it the first night she was thankful he wasn't with her. She lay perfectly still as all the stories that Mother and the other women had told her of what to expect went through her mind.

She had heard stories of births that started in the morning and finished before the midday sun, others that had lasted days and some that had ended in the death of the mother, the child or both. She viewed every scenario in her mind and readied her soul for whatever was to happen.

When Taysha's mind started to leap the chasms between the possibilities of dying giving birth or one of the wolves eating her child, she figured it was time to call out to the family. Mother and Father were up right away and helped move her into position with her bum half over the earth by the fire area. The hut filled with an odour Taysha wasn't familiar with and she looked at Mother to see her reaction. Neither Mother nor Father looked as if it was anything wrong, so she put her head back and breathed nervously in anticipation of the coming battle.

"Get Bajesh," Father said to Brother who had got up at Taysha's call of alarm and was dressing himself.
The cold, the fear, and the growing pain made Taysha shake while Grandmother shooed out Father and stoked the fire. Extra wood, water and birthing cloths were brought in and two of Mother's friends came to help.

For a while, the Pains came quickly and intensely, then stopped. The way Taysha was sitting quietly with her eyes closed made some of the women wonder if it would even happen at all that day but they soon saw she was simply enduring the pain. The periodic clenching of her jaw and her laboured breathing were the only indications of what she suffered.

"She really is different from us," Mother's friend said as they watched her.

"Don't fight against it, love," Mother said as she wiped Taysha's forehead, "Breathe..."

Taysha's just wanted to stop herself from breaking down and crying. This was like nothing she had ever experienced. She thought it must feel like being stabbed with a spear. That idea made her start whispering apologies to the wolf and bear she had killed. Images of her mother flashed through her mind and she felt a flood of mixed emotions rush through her.

"Where in the shit of the gods is BAJESHHhhhhh," she hissed in Osfer, trying to keep her mind occupied, "Blasted boy!" she cried out as an intense pain hit her, "Probably up fucking Bahnu!"

Mother caught the name of her son through the babble and answered something but Taysha didn't notice.

"Where IS Bajesh!" Taysha demanded in Wedic. She had lost her control. She sat wide-eyed and huffing as the women huddled around her, offering words of support while staring between her legs.

In this scene, all Taysha could think of was how silly she sounded speaking Wedic. She switched back to her native tongue as she arched her head in a spasm of pain.

"Oh gods be damned," she forced out at her first chance to take a breath. She was at least glad she could curse the gods in her language seeing as the Wedic never did. She had learned early in her language lessons not to do so.
"It's good, Taysha," said Mother, who had the honour of being her midwife.

"You'll be quick. Push." Taysha jumped and gasped as Mother's cold hands touched her most private areas. Mother looked up at Taysha staring at the ceiling with wide eyes and a look of great annoyance, anger and fear on her face. It was a feeling Mother remembered well herself.

"Sorry, love. Remember to think and breathe, push and breathe, think and breathe, push and breathe."

"I'm just here," Bajesh's voice came from outside.

"No men in the birthing huts," once of the women called back.

" _Another stupid rule,"_ thought Taysha. She looked up as if she was trying to see through the roof.

"My tribe..." she gasped out between breaths "...is family time ... for birthing. Is for ... family ... ugh! Whew ... my family. Where ... where is my family?"

The words came out with a sob as she cried and momentarily surrendered to the physical pain of the present and mental pain of the past.

"We're right here," said Mother in a tone that indicated her disapproval at being overlooked. The tone of her voice brought Taysha back to concentrating on her breathing.

"Sorry ... Huff puff ... always ... Huff puff ... trouble for ... Huff puff ... troubleforyou ... Huff puff."

"Don't be silly, you're my daughter now," Mother answered and Taysha noticed the women in the hut share glances as if to question the validity of her statement. It angered Taysha but she didn't know if she had read the looks correctly.

" _Not something ... youcan... dealwithnow,"_ she told herself as yet another severe cramping consumed her.

"Oh gods. I can't do this. I gotta get out of here," she said out loud in her native tongue as she tried to grab onto something to pull herself up.

Her shoulders were gently pushed back by the two women at her side and Mother's hand was on her stomach.

"Push," she said plainly.

Taysha tried right away. Anything to get rid of the onslaught of pain. At first it didn't seem right. She couldn't find the right muscles for this.
But an oncoming contraction seemed to find them for her and she followed through until she realized the pain was from her pushing, rather than the cramp.

She let her head fall back into the pillow held by Grandmother.

"Good. Very good, Taysha. You can do this. Work hard and it will end soon," she said encouragingly.

Something about the way Grandmother spoke told Taysha everything she needed to know. She was affecting the outcome herself. She was able to control what was happening to her. The longer the baby stayed inside her, the longer the pain would last. She could, and she would, do this.

"... nnn nnnngggghhAAHHHH!" she screamed as she pushed, now knowing what parts of her body to use.

"Oh ..." a surprised gasp from Mother made her stop and look.

"No, no." Mother looked up, addressing Taysha's hesitation with a smile, "It's great. You're doing great," she added as she passed one blood soaked cloth to the woman beside her.

Taysha noticed the blood and wondered if Mother was just lying to her so she wouldn't worry. The thought worried her. She told herself it was part of the process and concentrated on pushing. They did say there would be a lot of blood. What they didn't tell her about was the smell. To Taysha, the whole hut smelled like the blood of a freshly killed animal. Had the pain been less intense she might have been sick.

" _Funny,"_ she thought as she inhaled for her next push, _"To me it's the smell of death ... but I suppose to these women this is the smell of life."_

"Strange ... it's all so strange," she mumbled to herself.

"Don't lose it now, Taysha. You're a strong girl ... you're a strong woman. Do you hear me?" came the coaching from Mother who had decided Taysha could spend more time pushing and less time talking to herself.

"YessSSSSSSS!" Taysha answered with another push.

" _Goddess ... the smell ... ugh,"_ she thought, _"Open the cursed door, you stupid women. I don't care if anyone sees ... Damn you! Damn all this!"_
Most of the tribe was now outside the closed door, eagerly waiting for the baby to be born. Taysha could hear them talking about how beautiful the baby will be, because Bajesh and Taysha were both good looking.

Bajesh sat by the door, quietly listening to Taysha's struggle.

In a short time, the muffled groans inside the hut turned to yells and sent Bajesh pacing back and forth with his hands on his head.

"Is this normal?" he asked Father anxiously.

The reply was a simple nod.

"Gods..." Bajesh lost his words in his pacing.

For the Wedic tribe, this time was called the Birth of Three. It symbolized the birth of the baby and the birth of the new parents into their second adulthood. All three were to endure their share of physical and mental pain. The Wedic felt the physical struggles of the woman during birth were equal to the hardships of the lifetime of the man – felling trees and hunting and digging and hauling, lifting and building, fighting and defending the village. It was in giving birth that a woman earned her place among those who worked on lighter tasks and chores. It was also a common joke that a hardworking man would seek his revenge by having his wife bear many babies.

Bajesh never saw humour in such things.

The morning wore on and the other women of the tribe brought over honey sweets and teas for those waiting around the hut. Most had taken their refreshments away from the sounds of pain.

Bajesh ate nothing but continued to pace. No attempt to console him was made, as it was a journey of the mind that he had to take alone. He thought of all the times he had been rude or curt to Taysha, and especially his not having sex with her though he knew she wanted to. It bothered her and he knew it. He thought about all the times he had talked to the other girl in the village that he knew liked him. He wondered about what it would be like if Taysha was just not there one morning. The times he thought it would be easier for him and his family if he just married one of the village girls.
Then his pacing stopped as the noises from within the hut ended.

There was a silence that seemed to last far too long, then came the cry of a baby, followed by the cooing of a hut full of women. Taysha had given birth to her first child.

She and Bajesh had reached their Second Adulthood.

Bajesh let his breath escape slowly through his lips. He would now have to be patient until the women had readied the hut for visitors. He stood waiting, at his rightful position in the front of the line. He would be first in and all would vacate the hut for the bonding of the Birth of Three.

In a span of time that seemed to take longer than the actual birth, he was constantly having his head shoved back out of the door by the busy women or being pulled back by one of his friends. Finally Bajesh was allowed in. The hut was hot and the smell of blood lingered. Taysha lay cuddled in a bed of furs, with the baby on her chest, wrapped in cloth.

"Is it a boy or a girl?" he asked.

Taysha looked over with an unexpectedly vague expression.

"A girl," she said simply.

Bajesh sat beside her. He put his hand out to touch his daughter's face and her tiny fingers.

"Can I hold her?" he asked, smiling.

"Mmm..." she answered.

Bajesh was careful to hold the head as he had been taught long ago, and sat back down with a big smile on his face. It was the smile that bothered Taysha. She had been lying there, holding her daughter as the women bustled about, cleaning, congratulating and otherwise making a great fuss.

Taysha hadn't felt excited in a way that matched their enthusiasm. She felt as if her eyes had grown cold and empty and her mouth speechless. She had not been thrilled or thankful or happy. In fact, it was remembering the Wedic women telling her of the tears of joy that fell afterwards that bothered her the most. She felt no such overwhelming sensation.

If any tears fell from Taysha's eyes, they wouldn't be from joy. They would be because she felt neither love nor hate. And she knew she should be feeling something, at least.
The only thing that flooded her mind was the thought of being able to start training again. The sight of Bajesh's obvious happiness made her feel distanced from them both. The re-occurring thought haunted her that it would be good to leave their daughter with him when she went to the Great Water.

She stared off into space, trying to stop thinking. Bajesh noticed her and gave her a nudge. When she looked at him, he smiled. She smiled back and then he looked back at his daughter.

"What do you want to call her?" he asked.

"Shaymo," she answered without hesitation.

"Why that name?" he inquired.

"It is my mother's name."

Bajesh's face became serious.

"It's a great name," he said, "What does it mean?"

"It mean..." she hesitated as she searched for the proper Wedic words, "I don't know word, but 'shay' mean warm or nice ... like, nice-feeling. Like "Oh! This is good. This is nice."

She demonstrated by snuggling into the bed of furs.

"Comfortable?" he asked.

"Maybe..." she answered, not really knowing, "So, comftrebo..."

"Comfortable."

"Yes. That and 'mo'. 'Mo' in my language is like 'hut' but it mean more in my language. Not just place ... but feeling. Feeling of family. Secure. Safe ... many things."

"Comfortable Home," Bajesh concluded, "Shay-mo ... Shaymo."

She looked at this good and intelligent man who once again had turned his attention to his daughter. He always knew what she was trying to say. It was a small but important thing. He was the one sent to her by the Goddess and he now held his reward for his kindness in his hands.

" _I guess it's all good then,"_ she thought as her eyes darted between him and their daughter. She finally smiled easily.

"It's a great name," repeated Bajesh, "I thought we could just translate it into our language, but, you're right, our word for 'hut' is just 'hut'. Comfortable Hut doesn't sound right..."
He looked down at his daughter again.

"I like her name, but I was wondering... maybe, if we could give her a Wedic name too. So the kids don't tease her."

Taysha agreed.

"How about Dania?" Bajesh suggested, "It's rarer in our tribe but people know it."

"What does it mean?"

"It means to keep things safe or for food it means to p _reserve_. But, for a name it would mean something like 'defending?' 'Defender?' My other grandmother's name was Dania. It was a more common name with the other tribes, I think."

Taysha nodded.

"Okay. Then she is now Shaymo-Dania, daughter of Bajesh and Taysha," she settled.

"...of the Wedic and Amazoi," Bajesh added.

And so it was agreed on and Bajesh brought little Shaymo-Dania out for the others to see. There was a small family gathering to celebrate the birth in the hut later that night, but the main feast would be in a month's time when Taysha had rested and healed.

\- - - - -
As they sat drinking at the main fire with their friends at the celebrations of their Second Adulthood, Taysha asked Bajesh about the expression "Birth of Three."

"What if there is more than one baby?"

"Then we call it the Birth of Four," he replied jokingly, "No, I'm kidding. It's just called the Birth of Three because most people have one baby at a time. If there's another baby, no one calls it anything different."

"What happens after second baby?"

"Then she cuts his pesky cock off," whispered a very drunk Ashritha.

"Oh ha ha," her husband shot back, "You could never do that. You love it too much."

Ashritha curled her hands up to her eyes pretending to cry. "Boo hoo hoo. What has everyone been telling you?"

"Everyone? What do you mean 'everyone?'" he retaliated with a look of mock concern.

"Oops," she giggled slyly.

"Seriously," Bajesh turned back to Taysha, "it's just a Birth. A Birth of One I guess. Never thought about it before."

Wayu burped and added, "It describes the celebration of the Second Adultho..."

His sentence was cut short as Adit put his hand on his shoulder and stepped over the bench.

"Hi there kid!" he raised his chin at her as he sat down with the group. "So when are you training again?" he asked.

"Ugh," replied Taysha, "Don't know. I feel like baaaadd kick in baaaad place. Don't want to move for a while."

Adit laughed with a quick look down at her crotch, "Yeah. I can only imagine. This is why all the men should be training. To experience some of the pain of birth daily," he said in his usual way of mixing being wise with being a smart ass.

Bajesh and his friends either looked away or smiled politely.

"I agree," Taysha replied pointing at him to emphasize the sense of his idea.

"No worries. It's too cold to train anyway. And you're still stronger today than you were this time last year."

"I ... I am what? I didn't understand any what you say."

"Well..." he stood without explanation for his dramatic exit, "I see your language skills haven't gotten any better."

He puffed out his cheeks and raised eyebrows before turning to leave.

"Let her know what I said, Bajesh," he called back as he walked on to extend his formal congratulations to Bajesh's parents.

"Tell her yourself ... Goose," Bajesh whispered so only those around him could hear.

The well-placed usage of Taysha's original Wedic insult set everyone laughing. For a brief moment it looked as though Adit would come back and challenge the mockery. But after a moment of hesitation and a look at Taysha, he turned and walked away. Bajesh didn't like the look he gave Taysha but she recognized it as one of respect. Adit was letting Bajesh's rudeness go out of respect for her.

As Ashritha and her husband continued their banter and the others talked around her, Taysha found herself picturing Shaymo-Dania, asleep in her wrapping cloth in the hut. She had stopped thinking of her name. Every time she did, she saw her mother's face. Taysha would tell her the meaning of her first name when she was old enough. Until then, Taysha would just call her, "Hey, you."

" _Having a baby was supposed to take a few months,"_ she thought exhaustedly, _"but with the Sickness the first few months, then you get a huge belly, then you bleed for two months more. This is stupid."_ She was beginning to see the sitting around and talking and sewing and making meals as a well-deserved rest in exchange for this pregnancy dung. No thanks. Not for her. Not again.

"You all right?" Bajesh asked, catching her mood.

"Yes. I'm just tired. I want rest now."

"Yeah. Sure. I'll help you back to the hut. Hey, people ... Taysha's going to bed."

Bahnu gave one last smile and a kiss to Taysha before joining the others as they continued in drunken jubilee.

Bajesh walked back with Taysha and held the door open for her.

"Did you need to pee?" asked the tipsy Bajesh.

"No, thank you," she answered as she headed straight for the sleeping-furs. Bajesh came in as well and lay down beside her.

"Soon we'll be back at your hut," he added and placed his forehead on hers for a moment before getting back up.

"Bajesh?"

"Yeah?"

"No _luk-luk_ with Bahnu, okay?" she said using the Amazoi word for fucking. She used it because Bajesh could say it without becoming embarrassed, "Only three together, okay? Just wait. And we be together again..."

Taysha felt the wine running through her words.

"Yeah, I won't," Bajesh replied with an understanding smile, "It's not just _luk-luk_ , you know? I miss _you_ , not that. I ... I don't know if that made any sense. I ... I'm pretty drunk here."

"Yes. I understand. But, you tell me all right? Maybe you love Bahnu. Now I only need you."

Bajesh stood swaying for a breath or two.

"Now _you're_ not making sense," he said, smiling down at her, "Look. I'm sorry I haven't been there for you. This whole baby event is strange ... strange and new. It just didn't seem right to me. But, I'm all right now. When you stop your bleeding we'll have wild and animal _luk-luk_ again, all right? Next baby I'll know what to expect."

The words "next baby" echoed in her head as he finished with a kiss on his own fingers and tossed it to her. As he started to go out the door, he stopped and stepped back inside.

"I'll be sitting right there." he said pointing in the direction of the main fire, "Or peeing right there." He pointed behind the hut. "Or sleeping right there," he said as he pointed to the furs beside her. "Don't worry, my ... wait a moment!" He staggered back. "I don't even know what your name means. I am such a goose."

Taysha snorted a laugh at his cute use of her now famous curse word.

"Uh ... my name is too hard translating."

"Try," he said, leaning on the wall.

"Tay ... this is like 'come here' but more meaning in my language. It stronger ... uh, let's see ... like, _be safe_. Uh, we say _'tay mo.'_ 'Tay mo' simple meaning is 'come to hut' but ... hmm. 'Taymo' it is as wish for person come home safe. Understand?"

"Yeah. Sure. I think so," he replied with a drunken shrug.

"And 'sha'? Sha is water on grass in early morning."

"Dew?"

"Dew? I don't know what is _dew._ "

"It's, uh, the water on the grass early in the morning."

"Yeah 'dew'. So for Amazoi, dew is important. It is water from gods. Really from Goddess Ulforta. It is love-water of goddess earth, you understand? So, it very sexual but is very serious and important for our people. It is symbol of beginning life. It is birth of first Amazoi."

"Oh," Bajesh sighed, "So your name is 'Coming Dew'..." He pondered as he repeated the words to himself, "Yeaaaah. It does sound strange in our language but I can understand it. So, really it means, like, 'a welcome beginning of Life.'"

Taysha liked his translation of her name and smiled.

"That's a great name," Bajesh continued, still swaying at the door, "My name is like a name of some god we don't even worship anymore. I don't know. One day you should give me a name from your tribe. They seem to have deeper meanings. Well. Gotta go pee. I'll see you soon ... you won't have to worry, I won't go anywhere."

He stumbled out of the door to the calls of his comrades by the fire.

True to his word, he was in one of those three places that night. Taysha could tell because she was awake until he returned.

The next morning Taysha woke to the sounds of him throwing up behind the hut and talking to himself.

"Oh, this is stupid ... never again ... never a ... wHuahhhhhhak!

"Go do that in the forest!" Father yelled out to him with a slap of his hand on the hut wall.

"Ah," Brother groaned as he got out of bed, "And to think, he is now my senior..."

\- - - - -

It wasn't even midwinter before Taysha had started planning their move back to her hut. Bajesh's parent's hut had been getting smaller and smaller the longer they stayed. But mostly, it was Taysha's realization a lot of her worries about Bajesh and Bahnu were because she was genuinely in love with Bahnu as well.

She missed her.

She missed having time alone together and that was all they talked about when out of earshot of the others. A subtly brushed finger along a hand was enough to make Taysha's heart pound. And it was apparent the deep feeling was shared.

Bahnu told Taysha how she missed her company, her humour and her sex. Bahnu even admitted to missing the training – at least, just a little bit. She missed how they sat around topless together, how Taysha would mumble in her sleep, and how she would blow on the soup in her spoon until it was cold before she would put it in her mouth. She missed her smile, the determined look on her face when she trained, and the way she played with the wolves ... the list was almost endless for both of them.

Now that the long wait was over and they started moving back to their home, Taysha's first concern was for Ushi and Wada. She had gone alone to see them when she had stopped bleeding from the birth. There was much ado when they saw her return. They jumped and yelped and she hugged and rolled with them. Even then, she kept a wary eye for any sign of aggression and her free hand was never too far from the knife in her boot. But as usual, Ushi and Wada were fine. They were as loyal and gentle as ever, although Taysha was less than pleased to see they had been shitting on her training grounds.

The time had come to introduce Shaymo-Dania to them. When Taysha came back with her daughter, she brought Bajesh and Bahnu with her. Bajesh was carrying his spear and Taysha held her larger waist knife under Shaymo-Dania as she held her down for the wolves to see. Their noses were already in the air before she got to them. After the first few cautious sniffs they showed an understanding that there was a new family member. Perhaps it was the shared smell of the mother.

Whatever it was, they accepted the baby and, most of all, they were glad to have Taysha back again.

For Bahnu, the return was initially exciting for her but she gradually felt out of place especially when she watched Bajesh and Taysha holding their daughter together. Or when Shaymo-Dania cried at night and Taysha sat nursing her.

In her village, there was a saying:

" _Better to be a third arm than a third leg."_

It meant if you're an extra person in a group, be useful or you will just be in the way. At first, Bahnu just did the cooking and cleaning as usual, but when Taysha had fully recovered from the birth, Bahnu ended up caring for Shaymo-Dania more than her other duties.

On the first day Shaymo-Dania even tried solid food, Taysha wrapped her still full breasts in cloth and announced she was going hunting. By herself. For the first time in a year. As she got ready, Bajesh was groggily reheating some fish from last night and yawned for her to be careful.

"How long will you be?" asked Bahnu.

"I don't know. A day or two maybe."

"What about Dania?"

Taysha stopped getting ready and looked at Bahnu with that face that made her feel stupid. It was obvious Bahnu would be caring for the child until she got back.

Taysha gathered a couple days worth of meat and grains, put on her winter pants and cloak, and topped it off with her wolfskin. Wrapping a waxed hunting blanket over her back and grabbing her bow and arrows, she stepped outside to put on her boots.

"Which direction are you heading in?" Bajesh asked in case she didn't return when expected.

"I think I can go up mountain pass again. But if there is new snow then I just come and then north side of village, then to Hunting Grounds."

The Hunting Grounds was the name for the vast valley that ran north-south below their bowl-shaped valley. From that valley, the hidden access to the Wedic village was seen as a most uncomfortable climb up through a steep ravine.

Bajesh knew it was a two-day walk from the village in the summer, but he said nothing.

He knew "one or two days" could mean anything.

When his father had done what Taysha was now doing, they never knew when to expect him back. But he always returned with a deer or a boar along with smaller animals hanging from his belt.

Sometimes a man ... or a woman... just needed to be alone with the gods.

His biggest worry was not for her safety, for she would be taking the wolves and she could handle herself out there better than he could, but it was the idea of her getting a deer and trying to drag the damned thing back. That could wear her out. And sweating in the winter weather would bring sickness and chills with it.

"Bring some rope," he suggested, chewing on his breakfast, "If you bag something too big, you can hoist it up a tree and come back for help."

"Yeah. Good idea," she replied to his relief and she crawled back into the hut to get some rope.

"See you soon. See you soon. See you soon," she said and kissed the members of her family on the forehead.

"In my language, you say to me, 'Tay mo.' Remember? Is 'Tay' like my name. It is wish for safe return. 'Tay mo.' You try."

"Tay mo," they both said.

Taysha could see the sadness and frustration in Bahnu's eyes, but she ignored her and replied, "Ar uverbim minar to."

"As the goddess wishes." Bajesh repeated the translation to Bahnu and popped another piece of fish into his mouth.

Taysha had mixed feelings about hunting in the snow now. The advantage the tracks the animals gave her used to be something she liked. Now it gave her a feeling that it almost wasn't fair. On the other hand, it was slow moving and though trails were abundant there was never any sight of the fox, squirrel, rabbit or wild cat that had made them. The birds that she could count on to make up for an unsuccessful hunt were all gone as well. But the disadvantages of winter hunting didn't bother her so much. She darted in between the patches of snow around her forest as she started the familiar climb to the mountain pass that connected her to her old home and past life.

Her original idea of running up the mountain was quickly abandoned as her lungs felt the sting of the winter air. Yet, rather than feeling disappointed in her lessened condition, she plodded along joyfully.

All Taysha had wanted was to be alone and think, and that's exactly what she did. She mostly thought of the unexpected outcome of her journey and the length of her stay. Since her slain family and friends had long since been taken across the Great Water, she took to telling them all that had happened since she had last seen them. She carried on in this manner until the skies started to darken.

Her pace had been too slow.

She wouldn't make it to the top of the pass before dark if she didn't hurry. She started to run up the forested hill until she could see the clearing of sky straight ahead. The mountain pass was blanketed in snow, but it had settled enough to make a climbable path to the top. She reached her goal moments after the sun had dipped behind the western mountains. She stood knee-deep in snow, wrapped in her furs looking back down to the valley from which she had just climbed. The greyish-black smoke from the Wedic village was noticeable against the spotted white background.

She turned to look down the rock slide that she had climbed up over two winters ago. The wind picked up and she steadied herself against it as she stared at nothing in particular. The sudden idea of going back to where the Hoorg sat smug in their huts and killing one of them started to run over and over in her mind. Better yet, kill the women and children. It didn't matter to her. It would serve the Hoorg men their deserved right to watch their families be killed in front of them. Feel the pain of being left alive. That would be their punishment for their cruelty and stupidity. To her new mind now trained in tactics, memories of the Hoorg attack on her village now seemed sporadic and lacking strategy.

" _Perhaps others got away,"_ she pondered as she checked to see if the wolves were all right in the wind. They hardly noticed the weather as they jumped and played and explored around her. "The time it took me to get here ... was it 10 days? More?" she whispered as she pulled at some hair that had blown into her mouth.

She was sure she could now go to _and_ return from her old village in ten days. Scout the land. See where the Hoorg really were. Maybe Adit would go with her.

Or even Father or Anami ... no, probably not on a journey of revenge. But, Adit, yes, he probably would. He was crazy enough to ... proud enough to.

Even Little Dinesh probably would. He would come of Age that year or the next at least ... if she trained hard again, she would be ready before the coming summer. If she confided in Adit and Dinesh, they could train in secrecy. Practice stealth and tactics. Not just fighting, but real tactics of war.

She was pretty certain the Council and even Anami would not support such a venture. But Taysha was not a Wedic and needn't worry about that. Besides, there was some purpose Taysha had been led to the Wedic. She had undeniably been stopped there by forces greater than her, and she had not been allowed to find the Great Water... or allowed to die.

Now, with her skills and abilities, the choice of not seeking revenge seemed cowardly.

There in the subtle glow of the sunset, with the wind throwing her hair and the snow around her, she promised herself. She would put her plan into action. Prepare to leave and find the Hoorg before next autumn.

If she found no one to support her, she would go alone and kill as many of the pig-fucking Hoorg as she could.

\- - - - -
For the most part, that winter came and went peacefully. Dania had taken more to Bahnu now that Taysha had stopped breastfeeding her. And that was fine for Taysha. She needed the time to train. She had come to like winter training the best. It made her feel that she was fighting not only against herself but against the power of the gods. She felt stronger when she trained under such conditions. And she liked the way her body looked as it steamed in the cold.

Though the extra soft skin around her stomach remained, she once again looked fighting fit by the first thaws. When she felt her condition acceptable, she presented her plan of raiding the Hoorg to Adit.

His first reaction was one of surprise that she had even approached him. After a couple of his usual jokes he quickly became serious as he started to understand her proposition.

His answer was both good and bad for her.

Good in the way he liked the idea and was wise enough to first confirm with her this was not to be talked about to everyone. The bad part was he refused to allow Little Dinesh to even hear about it. Not only did he feel him too young, he was the grandson of Councilman Dinesh. His death or injury would see to Adit's and Taysha's end in the Wedic village.

The image of the Wedic standing at the entrance to the village as she and Adit were banned from living there and were forced to start a new life together flashed through her head.

"We need more than two." Taysha argued.

"Yeah, but not him. He's only twelve, Tash."

He had taken to calling her by his nickname for her. She liked it. He was the only one who called her that, and it made a special connection between them.

"Twelve?" she retorted, "Better than ten and better than two peoples."

"Yeah, right," he replied in his usual flippant manner. "Can you imagine Dinesh fighting Anami? Or Bajesh's father? Or any of the men you see at the village. He has six more years of muscle to add. And weight ... Sorry, no ... I won't allow it."

The first hindrance to her plans made her look off into the distance and think. She knew she could trust Little Dinesh with her life. Her mind raced around through the others she might rely on.

"Look," Adit continued, seeing her reaction, "I'm pretty sure Ariya and Bahrat would love to hear of your plans. I would rather trust my life to them more than anyone."

Taysha knew Bahrat well enough. He was a larger man than most who usually kept to himself. Ariya, she knew little of, though he seemed to be a serious sort and worked hard like most of the other Wedic. But both of them assisted Anami during the training sessions.

"Wouldn't be problems for Anami?" questioned Taysha, "If all teachers disappear suddenly?"

"Yeah but it won't be a problem if we tell him in advance. Tell him we're all going off to see if there are survivors in your old village."

"Yes, but for ten days or more?" asked Taysha.

"I don't think it would raise suspicion ... uh, suspicion? That means 'make questions for people' I guess. No one knows how far your village is. Anyway, once we're gone, no one can do anything about it. All we have to do is make sure no one knows the real plan and we can train openly all we want. Even get the kids or some of the men to act as the enemy so we can learn those little details we would never think of."

"Okay. Okay. Too fast. You always talk too fast. But I understand. You ask Ariya and Bahrat. I keep secret."

"What about Wayu?" Adit asked.

"Wayu? My friend?" she thought of the soft-spoken young man about Brother's age.

"He's a good fighter. Solid," Adit praised.

"I can ask him," Taysha replied, not really sure of what to think about it.

"Have you told Bajesh or Bahnu?" Adit asked.

"No," she said simply and closed her lips tightly.

"Good. It's better you didn't. For now anyway. They would just worry. All right, you ask Wayu, I'll ask the others and I'll let you know when I know. "

"I'll let you know when..." She paused to figure out the meaning in her head. "Right, yes ... I ask Wayu, then wait."

Adit met the challenge with full conviction and perhaps more enthusiasm than he would even admit to himself.

The thought of testing himself in combat far outweighed any conflict his soul might have had of going with the purpose of randomly killing a man. Besides, after what they had done to Taysha, these _Hoorg_ bastards deserved it.

Ariya and Bahrat were not so easily convinced.

"So we hike over to this Hoorg tribe..."asked Ariya suspiciously, "And kill the first man we see? Just like that?"

"Just like that. Something like that," said Adit, who had nothing else to justify the venture.

"Three of us can't fight a whole tribe," added Bahrat.

"Well, four, including Taysha. Five if she gets Wayu. And we're not going to fight the whole tribe. We'll sneak around, find out where their main water source is ... routes in and out of the village, and ambush one or two of them when the timing's right," Adit explained.

"Hmmm." Bahrat bit the side of his lip as he thought. Ariya continued the argument on his behalf. "I think it's more of a problem of just going over there to kill someone. It's pretty messed up, Adit. We train to defend ourselves, not to murder people."

The straightforwardness of Ariya's words made Adit sit back and rethink. The only conclusion he came to was he envied Taysha her goddess that didn't over-complicate things.

"All right," he said, "Ariya, I understand what you're saying. Fine. It's true, and I agree. But it's not about us three going off to kill someone for fun. It's about Taysha. She's going to go with or without us. It's pretty obvious. If you don't believe me, talk to her yourselves. Ariya, you have a sister about the same age as Taysha right?"

"Yeah. About that, I'd guess," he answered, already knowing he was being set up, "Okay, I know where you're going with this. If she was my sister, what would I do? Right?"

Adit nodded as Ariya continued.

"Honestly. I don't know. If we were all killed and she was left alone, would I want her to take revenge for us? Or would I want her to live a long life with her new daughter and a good husband?"

Adit's head started to wobble back and forth a moment.

"But, you see..." Adit argued back, "That's what I want to say. It's not about 'you' and what you would want. Or me. Or Bahrat. It's about what a young woman needs to do to settle her soul. She's definitely within her rights. Definitely. Neither of you can argue that. The question is: are you willing to let her go off by herself? Or will you go with us to defend her?"

Ariya disliked his usage of _us_.

It suggesting Bahrat was already going. Or maybe Adit just meant himself and Taysha. It didn't really matter, Adit had won. He was as good with his mental fights as he was with his physical. The argument wouldn't have worked on anyone else but that, of course, was why Adit was only talking to them.

"What do you think, Bahrat?" Ariya asked.

Bahrat shrugged, "It's not a clear fight. I don't want to hit someone in the back with an arrow. I would prefer a proper challenge."

"So would I," agreed Adit, "So would we all. But we don't speak that tribe's language, and they're too far to go back and forth to set up a challenge. And really, even if we could ask nicely, it would just bring the entire tribe down on us. You've heard the story of what they did to Taysha's people. They sound like the bastards that ambushed our tribe all those years ago. You see? Avenging Taysha would avenge our tribe ... in a way."

"Yeah. I guess. No raping though, all right?" added Bahrat.

"What?" exclaimed Adit, "Where did that come from?" he laughed, "No, of course not. Nothing like that. And no theft either. We do it as honourably as we can without bringing the full force of the village upon us. Agreed?"

Ariya and Bahrat looked at each other in silence before turning back to Adit.

"Agreed," said Bahrat.

"Agreed. With honour," said Ariya, sealing the deal.

Adit filled them in on details of what they would be telling the others.

As for Wayu, Taysha had nonchalantly asked him to meet her later in the day and asked him to bring his staff to train with her. He was taken aback by the sudden invitation to train with her, but met her at her Training Grounds with staff in hand.

After a couple of practice bouts with Wayu, Taysha could see the control and skill he possessed. It taught her a valuable lesson not to anticipate a man's ability by how he looked. Though Wayu was a decent size, he had a little too much of a belly for his age and the rounded face of a child. Nevertheless there was no doubt he could handle himself and his quiet demure convinced Taysha to tell him of her plans.

" ... and you're not going to tell Bajesh?" Wayu whispered. Taysha shook her head.

Wayu, now realising the reason he had been called over, planted his staff in the ground as he thought.

Taysha stood quietly waiting for his reply.

He turned to her with a sigh, "I don't think I'll be able to go with you but I can help train you and whoever is going... or maybe I should say, I'll train with you and then maybe go with you. I'm sorry, I'm not making sense. It's all dependant on my mother. When do you start training?"

"Tomorrow." Taysha answered quietly, now remembering his mother had been ill all winter.

Wayu wobbled his head a bit.

"All right. I'll show up tomorrow and just see what's going on ... talk to Adit and then I'll let you know for sure after that. All right?"

The lack of commitment made Taysha purse her lips at him, but she did know him as a trustworthy man. Thinking about their relationship as friends through the connections of their drinking group, she realized she had never spent a lot of time talking to him.

"How old are you?" she asked.

Wayu let out a little laugh at the sudden change of topic. "Twenty-seven."

"Twenty-seven!" Taysha exclaimed with wide eyes "But, you no married!"

"So?" he said with an embarrassed shrug.

"Wow," was Taysha's final word on the subject before confirming with Wayu what to say, what not to say, and most importantly; who not to tell.

\- - - - -
Although the real reason remained a secret, it was arranged with Anami that his three apprentices would be meeting Taysha every day in the afternoon to train in battle tactics. Anami unwittingly helped them in their plans by first coming to teach them exercises like moving in groups, crossing fields and streams, hand signals, night signals, the importance of protecting flanks, and how to react to an attack from any of the eight directions. Just as in hand-to-hand combat, he emphasised the advanced art of feint and deception, and using the patterns of the human mind to outwit the enemy.

It was a fun time for Anami. He was able to teach the things he never had the chance to. The knowledge and experience had been handed down from his grandfather and before, and had not been used since their people's army was many times larger than the entire population of their present village.

Although at first the lessons were not what Taysha and the other four needed for their raid, they had all quickly become interested in learning the new skills and they started spending more time on fighting as a group. They tested each theory against an invisible enemy until they felt it perfected, then they invited a few of the willing men and women to come out with their armour and shields to put their abilities to the test. These opponents were given wooden swords, spears or arrows wrapped in fabric.

In the first mock battle, Ariya had the idea to spread a thick, pasty burgundy dye on their weapons so they could see where they had been hit.

Taysha was bitterly disappointed at each attempt. Win or lose, there was not one battle where at least one of them hadn't suffered a cut on their neck or wrist or face. It had become clear that to make a fair fight of it would be to invite Death either in a random arrow or from wounds on the trip home. This was even truer for Taysha with her lack of heavy armour. She was surprised one day when Adit arrived with an extra full set tied together in one hand.

"This is _my_ armour. It's _not_ a gift. You understand that?" he said as he handed it to her outside her hut.

The first thing Taysha felt, as she took the small but heavy hardened leather armour, was Bajesh's presence.

He had been standing next to her when Adit started walking up to them. He didn't say anything but she caught a look in his eye that spoke of his jealousy and sadness. But these were not things that she could worry about now.

"It's my second set of armour," Adit continued, "I made it when I was younger than you. Maybe 14."

Taysha held it up and thought it looked like a bunch of scrap pieces tied together.

"Try it on." Adit said with a point from his chin at her. Taysha handed her bow to Bajesh, who was looking even less impressed than before. In fact, one could say he looked very angry. Taysha put Adit's set of armour on the ground and took off the modesty breast piece. Bajesh watched Adit's eyes take a quick look before he picked up the armour and started untying the pieces. He really hated that guy.

"You'll need an undershirt," Adit said as Taysha stood there waiting for him to untie the bundle, "Do you have a long-sleeved one?"

"Take mine," Bajesh quickly offered.

"Give me a hand with this," Adit commanded Bajesh as Taysha went in to get a shirt. There were no words spoken between them as they took everything apart and Taysha came back out pulling Bajesh's short fall tunic over her head. Adit took the front breast piece and pushed it up to her chest. It covered her shoulders, chest, front sides and stomach. The back piece was held up by Bajesh and they worked on fastening the straps.

"Usually, you only undo one side," Adit explained. "But I took it apart to clean and oil ... get the sweat-stink out of it."

Taysha fiddled with the armour as it got tighter against her.

"Squishy my tits," she said giving it a pull at the top.

"Yeah," was Adit's only reply as he finished with his side and picked up the shoulder attachments.

Soon Bajesh and Adit had Taysha in a full set of Wedic armour including coverings for her arms, hips and thighs. With a couple tugs to make sure Bajesh had secured his side properly, Adit stepped over to the bag he had brought with him.

"Here." he said simply as he pulled out a helmet for her. It was a mixture of leather, bronze and wrapped cloth which had been waxed and hardened. It had a nose guard that came down from the front and leather cheek coverings that doubled as a chin strap. Half a wolf tail that was dyed purple ran along the top from front to back. It was an amazing piece of work that she was proud to be able to use. Though it was heavy and a little too big, she filled it in with rabbit skins and looked far less ridiculous than Adit thought a girl would look in his armour. Taysha was happy because now she could really get in there and bash heads with the others.

Unfortunately that day was the most disappointing experience they were yet to have. Through Ashritha, Taysha had managed to gather seven of the younger Wedic women with the suggestion of trying out their bows.

Though the arrows went everywhere at first, they successfully ended up hitting each of the five members in the legs, arms and one just above Adit's eye. The fact that all the while the women were giggling and laughing at their own incompetence made the defeat all the harder to bear.

The group of would-be raiders admitted things went so much more smoothly until there were actual human beings in front of them who behaved sporadically and randomly. The initial idea of shooting someone in the back was actually becoming one of their safest choices.

They did confirm, however, what they already knew. Body weight made a huge difference when fighting against other armoured men. Even with Taysha's skills at unarmed combat, she either just bounced off her male opponents or was easily pushed out of the way. Adit eventually made the decision that Taysha would not move forward into the thick of battle but rather maintain a position to the rear with her bow. She wasn't happy at first about having to stand at the back, but she knew the men had been striking her less hard than they could have during the exercises, and some had even made it easy for her to win. To them it was a game, another fun event that Taysha had brought to their village. Taysha knew the Hoorg would not be so forgiving. And though she felt a bit out of the group, there was no denying it was the better choice.

The validity of her new position was quickly established when they fought the same group of young women that had caused them so much problem. From the start Taysha realized that keeping behind her group would only make shooting difficult, so she ran from tree to tree out to the side. As she did, she shot arrows into the group of women while her men advanced cautiously. This produced a split affect on the enemy's focus as she suddenly became their greatest threat. By the time the men had closed the distance between them, the three remaining women quickly surrendered.

It was their first great success in terms of all of them walking away unharmed. Unfortunately, getting shot with arrows meant the number of women willing to help declined.

Eventually young Kala and Ashritha were the only two women who would come out and they were placed among their male counterparts as Taysha's opposite.

The men who remained training with them that spring were more than happy to spend a cold, rainy afternoon playing war. By summer, they were down to five regulars who showed up on random days. Wayu, still thinking he would have to care for his mother and not be able to make the commitment to attacking the Hoorg village, would stand in for those on the opposite side for Taysha and her team to practice on. Bajesh had been one of the steady participants until Taysha confessed the reasons behind the training one drunken night and he dropped out in protest. He had no desire to support the mother of his child going off and getting herself killed. Ironically, it was Bajesh who added the pivotal piece to their tactical movements.

On a day when Wayu was tending to his mother, Taysha and the others talked Bajesh into filling in for him. Because Bajesh couldn't be bothered to go back to the village to get out his own armour, he simply took a long staff and stood behind the three men with full armour. The attempts of his three comrades to defend their armour-less stand-in ended up with the three forming a wall in front of Bajesh as he thrust his spear between them at Taysha's men. They went through their first battle and predictably Taysha's group eventually felled Bajesh and his men with Bajesh taking an arrow to his side.

He thought nothing of it until hearing Taysha, Adit, Ariya and Bahrat saying how difficult it was fighting against such a tactical structure. Not only were you fighting the three men with weapons in front of you, you had to keep and eye out for a _spear_ being shot out at you at waist or leg level.

After hearing their comments, Bajesh and his group talked amongst themselves to see if they could improve. They all agreed the worst part was Taysha outflanking them. The next time, by keeping closer together and pivoting as a group to keep at least one flanking shield in between Bajesh and Taysha's arrows, they broke Adit's rank, adding to one of his group's few total defeats. The only casualty was one of Taysha's arrows to the side of the front men but it wasn't a killing shot. Her comrades fell in quick succession after Bajesh had got the first cut on Ariya's leg. Adit attempted to call off the battle once it was obvious that the only thing for Taysha to do was run.

"So? I run?" she protested, "Let's see and we can train farther distance. In really, these Hoorg not stop. They will chase me. Maybe I can kill them and save you if you only injuries ... if you only injured."

Her "dead" team shrugged to each other.

"Sure. Why not?" Adit agreed, "There's always something we can learn from it. That is if these guys are content with running all over the forest after you."

"Sure. We don't mind," a confident Bajesh replied, "Need the exercise anyway."

"Have fun," came a comment from the _fallen_ , as he found a comfortable resting spot on the ground.

At the signal to continue, Taysha hit the first man in the thigh.

"So much for _my_ exercise," he said as he fell dramatically.

The other three were not so easy. The front two held their shields square and made long strides quickly towards her with Bajesh close behind. Taysha missed her first shot and was forced to run almost immediately. It was evident the combined running and shooting of her bow would not work. The large bow was cumbersome when rushing through bushes and low branches and the men were quickly closing the space between them.

But Taysha was not just lying down to die.

She notched her arrow and swung around, aiming directly for the face. The surprised pursuer instinctively raised his shield and she instantly dropped her aim down to his legs.

"Thwack!"

The fully tensioned arrow released into his thigh.

"Aaahh ... damn! Damn!" he yelled out as he crumpled at Bajesh's feet.

A cheer went up from her fallen brethren.

Taysha turned and ran, but caught sight of Bajesh taking the shield from the man as he ran past. It was just a little thing that made her proud of him. Her ears caught the sound of someone falling and she turned in mid-stride to see Bajesh's partner on his stomach. He had tripped over an exposed root and he was caught, stretched out over a fallen log. The moment her foot hit the ground she turned and shot for his open back.

In another moment of Taysha's pride in Bajesh, she saw him dive forward with his shield to try to protect her target but the arrow slipped in under it, hit the man on the back and bounced off into the brush. It was a probable kill. The man was more concerned with the pain in his ankle and waved his arm to show he was out of the game.

Her attention was now set to Bajesh, who stood half crouched over in his failed attempt to save his comrade. He stood to see her looking at him coldly with arrow notched as she aimed it at him through the trees.

"I surrender," he said, letting the shield and spear drop.

"Thwack!" The arrow hit him square in his chest.

"Oooohh!" the men whooped in unison.

"That one _had_ to hurt!" added Adit happily.

After the initial shock of pain passed, Bajesh looked up at Taysha with a look more of mental anguish than physical. She could see that he thought she shouldn't have done that. Perhaps he was right, but there was too much learned in that one battle to worry about Bajesh's feelings.

"We could use the tactic that Bajesh was using," Adit was saying as the whole group sat around the fire in Taysha's hut with hot tea in their hands, "We three up front. Two with large shields, one with a spear and Taysha behind protecting our flanks."

"The shields would be good to be rectangular, no?" Wayu suggested, "To protect the legs?"

"Well, that is if we even want to get that close in the first place," added Ariya.

Taysha sat holding Shaymo-Dania and she let a smile creep across her face as all the men looked at her.

"You can't underestimate the advantage of the bow," added the first man felled by Taysha.

"Not good for running though. Need extra weapon," Taysha added, "I was lucky, I think. Don't want lucky. Want skill. No chances."

"Well said, Tash," Adit continued.

"I think it's a good tactic if we find ourselves the ones being attacked," Ariya said, "We should practice it just in case. Otherwise, we keep doing what Taysha did. Space ourselves out. Use our bows."

"I agree," Bahrat added.

"Do you want to try the smaller bows that some of the women have?" one of the men asked Taysha.

"No. Thank you. I try last summer. Is not enough power. Good if everyone shooting arrows all over. But, this is very detail ... detail? Is this the right word?" she looked at Bajesh still lightly touching his chest where the arrow hit.

"Huh? Ah, probably _precise or exact._ "

"Yes. Exact. I need my bow. I know its feel best."

"Fair enough," he answered.

"We'll need to make some rectangular shields and try this tactic on a group that doesn't expect it, " added Ariya.

"Oh! I know who we can get. Just leave it to me," chortled Adit.

\- - - - -
It took a good number of days before the flaws of the new larger shields had been worked through. When they were done, Adit's friends were introduced to the Pain of Taysha's arrows as they readily volunteered for at least one session.

Taysha's group slaughtered them with every attempt.

Adit's friends had fought them before with relative success during the spring. They had lost more than they won but they had won some none the less.

But not this time.

After a series of thorough defeats a time for conference was called and they re-assembled to try their latest strategy. All of them rushing after Taysha? Failed. She would just run away and they would be caught from behind by the others. Two of them rushing after Taysha? Failed. The remaining two would be killed almost instantly against the compact group of the three men.

Surrounding the three men? Close. The sudden change of tactics almost worked, but the one caught in between the main battle and Taysha's arrows soon met his demise. Taysha did not hesitate to use an arrow aimed towards her own men. With that one man quickly out of the picture, they were able to hold back those on their opposite flank if not kill them outright.

The challengers thought they could work to improve on the final strategy by moving to the far side out of Taysha's line of sight. That would make her circle to get at them. When they put their theory into practice, they held Taysha's group at bay a much longer time. Though eventually defeated, the extra time it took made Taysha's group realize it would have been only a matter of time before more Wedic arrived.

Adit and the others openly talked about how to fix the new-found weakness of their strategy without changing their entire structure. They really thought they had a good battle tactic and wanted to keep it and improve it.

"Ah, don't ask us," joked one of the opposing side, "We're not telling you how to beat us."

"Come on. It's to help us learn," prodded Adit.

"I don't know," said one, "All I know is I'm trying to keep out of line of Taysha's arrows."

"Same here," added another.

"Why don't you swing closer, Taysha?" asked one man.

"I don't know what you mean."

"I mean, it's like you're standing out too far on an invisible line ... moving left or right. I mean, you could stand farther up, closer to our group. Or you could run right behind us. Now THAT would be unnerving."

He nodded in agreement with his companions.

"It would also make it more tempting to break ranks and chase you," added another.

"Yeah. Why don't you try that, Tash?" suggested Adit with a sweep of his arm, "Feel around. Don't worry about having to shoot. You don't have to. Just keep them moving. If they stop, shoot. Otherwise, keep running around them ... make them nervous."

The first results to put the tactic into play were a bit comical because the attacking foes knew her plans before they had started. All four of them ran to the opposite flank that Taysha stood at, trying to put themselves behind the human wall of her own group. Taysha proceeded to run around to almost the position they had originally come from, to which they continued to run to their right once more. It had become more of a chase than a battle, much to the enjoyment of their watching friends, who were almost crying with laughter at the spectacle.

Their strategy to keep flanking would have worked if it had not been for Taysha's group quickly realising their opponents were only able to move because they were not engaged.

Taysha's men rushed in, and with their opponents more focused on evasion, the end was quicker than their first battle of the day.

Taysha was disappointed she didn't get a single shot but she told herself her contribution was like Wada when the bear attacked.

It may not have been glamorous, but it was a necessary part of success.

\- - - - -
It was agreed on to attack the Hoorg after training for the remainder of the summer. Wayu had made it known he would not be able to commit to going with them. The four remaining would go at the turning of the leaves, when the various colours made it harder to find hiding creatures.

The topic of not killing women or children was brought up again, against Taysha's objections. The original decision of sneaking and hiding until they found the in and out route of a hunting party was gone over. It was also decided that if Taysha recognized any of the Hoorg, they would be the prime targets. And if needed, the time to set up the ambush would be lengthened if food stores held out.

They agreed that if she saw survivors from her tribe, the only way they would risk taking anyone back was if they were somehow separate from the main tribe. Otherwise, they would return to request a larger group of warriors from the village to rescue the Amazoi they had found.

"If they go down to river with Hoorg women, then we must to kill women or children. Taysha brought up the subject again.

"Taysha, I don't understand your need to kill women and children," rebuked Ariya.

"No, is not _'need'_ I am nervous because you look to me that you would die before you kill a woman or child. I am not going to die. I am going to kill. I come back alive for my family. Not die for gods' rules. So I can die at old age with peace in heart. If group of women see us, they will be 'Kiiiii ... Kiiiiiii'. Scream like crows and bring all the Hoorg men on top us. Why? Because you say it is wrong to kill woman. Oh great. This is nice for knowing," she argued cynically.

"All right. Just relax." Adit said through his hands that covered his face in frustration. He had gone through all of this with her before. "Why don't we just say that we leave it to the gods, and we..."

"That's what I think," interrupted Taysha, with a shrug. "Not say, we don't do this, don't do that. How do we know..."

"Hey!" snapped Adit, "I'm still talking."

Taysha looked back at him sternly, but kept her mouth tight. She wondered how Adit could affect her like that. If Bajesh had barked at her that way it would only have made her angrier.

She thought maybe that was the difference between loving someone and respecting them.

"We leave it to the gods," repeated Adit, "She's right. We can't go in there deciding what we will do or won't do. Not unless we're all willing to die for it. I'm not. Taysha's not. I doubt you two are either."

His open-handed gesture towards the two men was met with silence.

Ariya shook his head and mumbled, "I'm not killing any women or children."

"Fine then," Adit ignored the comment, "We agree we will kill anyone. Man, woman, child, animal that is a danger to us, or a danger of bringing the men of the village to us. Otherwise, if we are hidden, we will let them pass and live their lives. Agreed?"

"Agreed."

"Agreed."

Ariya sat with stone-cold eyes for a moment.

"You all do as your conscious tells you. I will do what the gods speak to me."

Adit gave a surrendering shrug.

They had been over all this before anyway.

"Fine. That's fine," he said, "And you," he turned to Taysha, "No jumping out of the bushes at women and children and going, _'Booooogy Woogy Woogy'_ , then saying, _'Oh, they see us. We have to kill them now.'_ "

The joke was met with snickers all around.

"I not _that_ bad," Taysha answered meekly with a smile.

"Pretty close," Adit answered, "Pretty close..."

\- - - - -
Sometime near the end of the summer, before the leaves had started to turn, Taysha sat on the grass playing with Shaymo and Bahnu when they saw Anami walking up to them carrying his spear. He was followed by Ariya and another man from the village. All three had weapons and leather breastplates.

The serious look on Anami's face told Taysha what she already expected. He obviously found out her true intentions with the Hoorg. Most likely Ariya had told him. The question now was how it would all turn out before she left for the raid and who would be coming with her, if anyone. A brief moment of pride mixed with her initial fear and uncertainty seeing that Anami felt he needed weapons, armour and two men to confront her.

"I think you had both better come with me to the village. There's a Council meeting," he said and pointed to Ushi and Wada lying peacefully in the shade, "You'd better bring them too," he said while the other two men stood looking in the forest around them. Anami walked over to Taysha's hut, poked his head in uninvited and stepped inside. The two women looked at each other and Taysha handed Shaymo over to Bahnu.

"Hey, what are you doing?" she called as she moved towards her hut. Before she could get to the door Anami came out carrying her spear and javelin.

" _Are you joking? You're going to take away my weapons over this?"_ Yet she was equally confused as he handed her both the items. Her quick look to Ariya for explanation was cut short as Anami spoke.

"Bahnu, ready the baby for travel. Bring me out Taysha's bow and arrows."

Taysha was already panicking.

" _They're sending me away. How can they do that? Not now. Not without a proper debate at least. Goddess ... help me."_

"I don't want go anywhere," she started to plead nervously as she looked back to Ariya who was keeping his eyes on the forest opposite the field.

"What?" Anami stopped looking around and focused on Taysha, seeing her fear.

"Go somewhere? Oh..."

He stopped himself, seemingly understanding what she was thinking.

"Sweet girl that you are," he laughed lightly, "How could we send you anywhere? No, my sweet," he added with a pat on her shoulder as he started to look around the forest once more, "One of our hunting parties came across a tribe that has made camp just below the ravine today. We're just being very cautious. We don't want you out here alone."

It was then Ariya looked at her. His solemn eyes told her that he had not said anything about the planned raid. Her secret was still safe. Behind him Bajesh came running up the path. He too had his spear with a small metal shield strung over his back.

"Ready?" he called as he approached.

"Wow, lots of excitement, huh?" he added as he ducked into the hut to get some things, "You'll be happy to know, Taysha, that all the women are armed. Most of them have their bows strung already," he called out from inside as he started throwing out the furs.

"Keep watch," Anami instructed the two men that came with him as he joined them in standing guard for the family to ready themselves.

"You scared me," Taysha finally said to Anami.

"I'm sorry," he laughed again while kneeling to look under the low-hanging branches around the field, "No one would send you away. Not while I'm alive, that's for sure."

" _I hope so,"_ she thought, _"We'll see ... after we return from the Hoorg."_

With valuables bagged and the wolves leashed, they made their way to the village. Taysha was surprised too see how much preparation had been done in one day. Anami had set up a double ring of sentries: one just within sight of the village and one with the fastest runners just out of sight of it. Taysha walked right past one of them on the outer ring before she even saw him. At the village, two or more men in armour and armed with spears stood between the gaps of each of the huts.

"This way it gives us more room to move inside the village for now," he explained to Taysha.

She felt honoured he wanted to explain.

"Come. The Council is waiting for us. Bajesh, Bahnu ... join your mothers."

Once again, Taysha felt honoured but genuinely confused as to why she was being singled out.

It seemed her feeling was shared by Bajesh and Bahnu who looked sadly at her. It was evident to them that Anami had found out about Taysha's plans to raid the Hoorg and was going to talk to her privately about it. Bajesh took Shaymo from Bahnu and she walked towards the main fire with Taysha, then off to her mother's hut. Taysha continued with Anami to the Elder Dinesh's hut.

Taysha's heart started beating so hard she thought she would faint. In the hut sat the Council members, several elders, Adit, Ariya, and Bahrat, Anami's father, the religious elder and a younger man. Among all these men, Taysha had a position to sit where she waited nervously.

When Anami had settled down, he explained the situation to Taysha on everyone's behalf. Apparently a hunting party had seen the pillars of smoke from their uninvited guests in the south end of the valley a few days before. The Wedic had seen trails of smoke in the valley before, but they were usually just a few wisps, most likely from a hunting party or travelling tribe.

This time they counted twelve smoke trails and there were undoubtedly smaller ones hidden by the thick trees. A group that large, in the middle of a valley at the end of summer didn't sit well with the Wedic. There was a good chance they could settle there for the winter. If they did, it would only be a matter of time before they found the village.

The ridge on which the Wedic lived was safely hidden from passers-by, but the bowl-shaped valley they were now in had been hunted out by its second year and it was rare for larger animals to climb up into it. There were no fish there either.

There were herds of deer in the valley below, along with countless fish in the river and boar, fowl and other small game. The main concern was the chance that this new tribe was hostile. In that case, there was no safety for the hunters so far away from the Wedic village and so close to this new settlement.

Knowing all of this when they first discovered the smoke, the Council had quietly sent out scouts.

The scouting party described the tribe as dark or brownish haired and fair skinned. Their domed huts were made completely of skins and they had a few horses. The word "horse" was one that Taysha did not understand. It was described to her as a large deer on which men rode.

She found the image in her head silly and laughed, but Anami's explanation of how these beasts could crush a man in battle wiped the smile from her face.

The description of their clothes was of thick cloth in earth-coloured tones. The scouts figured that they were Northmen, closer to Taysha's race than the Wedic. The main concern was that these people had sentries in full armour constantly on watch. This clearly showed it was a tribe with a sort of military order. Either they had a class of men who trained only for battle or they had a leader who was cautious and in full control of the men of the village. Neither of these things boded well for the Wedic.

"The reason we called you to the meeting young woman," said Councilman Dinesh, "is that we are hoping you may have a similar language. Our language is old and comes from the east. These men are neither from there, nor are they Southerners with whom we may share words of the Common Language of Trade. Would you go and speak to them for us?"

Taysha sat looking blankly up at the circle of men looking back at her. After the lengthy explanation from Anami, the quick summary of Taysha's role in all this was overwhelming. Unnerving, to say the least. She involuntarily glanced at Adit who avoided eye contact. She regained her composure and answered.

"Uh, I just walk to them ... say _Hi_?" she said in her typical fashion, producing a silent smile from Adit.

"No, of course not," said Elder Dinesh seriously, "We will send a runner with written word for an agreement to speak. If it is their good will, we can meet at a safe place. Can you write words?" He handed her a piece of thinned deer leather and a stick with dark dye on the end.

" _Write_ words? What is _write_? I don't understand?"

"To draw sounds," Adit tried to explain.

"Or symbols they might understand," added Anami, "Trees, wolves, birds, earth, sky..."

"Oh, I understand," she replied and took the leather and writing instrument. She drew the symbols of her family and her people: an owl, a raven, the sun, the earth and life, the moon, the goddesses' hand, a stag and the distinctive sign of the Amazoi.
"Good, good," said Dinesh as it was handed back to him, "This will help establish whether they share anything in common with your people."

He handed it to the younger man sitting beside him.

"Here... add something to indicate a desire to talk."

"Uh, this might take a while. Give me some time to think."

"Yes, of course," the councilman replied, "In the mean time, Anami, keep up the good work. And you, young woman, we would suggest you and your wolves stay with us for the time being. We don't know if they have scouting parties ... or worse, a war party ... out and about."

"Thank you, Councilman," she said, pleasantly surprised to see her thank you was acknowledged gracefully this time.

"I must apologize to you," he added as he stood to indicate the end of the gathering, "Both for today and for the first time you sat before us. Today it is our turn to say thank you."

He nodded to her and motioned his hand to the door for all to leave. The young man stayed behind, devising a combination of characters that would portray their message.

Taysha was in the group by the fire when the runner was chosen to give the message to the first person he saw. She knew the boy. His name was Panit. He was ten or eleven and the fastest runner of his age group. She questioned Anami's decision to send a child but she figured it was because a child was less of a threat.

Panit was escorted for two nights by three men to a rocky clearing in the large valley where they were proposing to hold the talks. In the early morning, he left alone in the direction of the unknown tribe.

Panit returned to his escort just before midday the same day, and they ran all the way back to the village.

"I came across a man and his father hunting," Panit started explaining back at the Wedic fire as he gulped water, "They didn't threaten me or anything, so I went up to them and I gave the scroll to the father, hand to hand. I think he understood the, uh ... the message, you know. He pointed to the rocky clearing right away, so they know about it. I think he asked me about the time so I said midday. No problems."

A unified sigh of relief came from all the Wedic.

It was also quickly noted they had no time to spare. It would take two days to get down to the clearing and a day to set up a respectable display for a formal meeting. The Council would need an honour guard comprised of Anami, his father and a few of the men in armour.

"...and I'd like you to be there too, if you could," Councilman Dinesh confirmed with Taysha.

"Yes. I would like that. It is honour for me," she said.

Taysha chose to go to this event in her modesty armour. She had long before permanently attached rabbit furs to the shoulders and hips making her feel rather regal. In all honesty, the decision to wear it was because of the looks she got.

Besides, she looked more like a cute boy when she wore Adit's full body armour. Not exactly how she wanted to present herself to a tribe that she may end up sitting among as an honoured translator.

For those men who remained, Anami had wisely ordered them to suit up in full armour and carry weapons at all times. Though Father was one of those who went, Bajesh was one of those selected to stay behind. He stood resting on his spear as he watched the diplomatic party set out before the sun had risen above the mountains. As the parade marched off across the field towards the ravine, Bajesh could see Adit talking and joking with Taysha as they went. He truly hated that man.

The diplomatic party left without any sleep but the mood was exhilarating. They made it to the rocky clearing by midday of the second day. Some of the helpers were organised to make a sitting chair for the councilman to sit in during the talks. Adit and three or four people in their group quietly expressed their distaste at Elder Dinesh's attempts to make himself out to be their chief.

The few women that accompanied the diplomatic party helped decorate their side of the clearing with bright ribbons and cloths on poles. The main camp was placed just out of sight in the safety of the forest and half the men were left to guard it.

The following day was the date of their Talks.
As they milled about on the morning of the meeting, the Council members proceeded to groom themselves. Hair and beards were combed, heads were wrapped in cloth and shoes were oiled.

Taysha felt unique in her outfit and enjoyed being set apart from the men and the other women. All the honour guard had waxed their leather armour. They kept their spears in their leather coverings as a show of peace. Anami had wrapped Taysha's spear for her as well.

"The spear will rip through easily if you need to use it," he admitted, "This is just a sign of respect and non-aggression. Looks pretty too." he added with a wink.

The sun was hot that day. Taysha was nervous but didn't show it. Conversely, the absolute lack of nervousness of the Councilman made her nervous. Watching him as he picked up his ceremonial robe so it wouldn't snag on the branches, she had an unexplainable desire to smack him on the side of his head.

"What an idiot," Adit whispered in her ear with a nod in the Councilman's direction.

Taysha smiled, but said nothing to give away her agreement of his opinion. She was busy being happy to be with the top fighters of the village. It made her feel safe and invincible. Adit had been put in charge of organising who stood where and he made sure the four from their war-group were positioned together.

"All right," he had told them earlier, "if anything goes wrong we stick to what we have trained for in the last few months. Even if everyone is killed around us, running out to try and save someone will just get us all killed. We'll help the fallen after it's all over. Agreed?"

"Agreed."

"Agreed."

"Agreed."

"Keep your bow on the ground behind us," he said to Taysha, "If something happens, drop the spear and get your bow, all right?"

Taysha nodded, then like the rest of them, turned to look across the field. The glare from the sun in the large clearing was a strain on the eyes but they could see runners from the foreign tribe arriving at the edge of the treeline.

They stepped out into the open and looked at the decorated area with a few of the Wedic women still adding bits and pieces to the trimmings. One took off back in the direction from where they came as the others stood silently watching from across the field. The rocky land was much longer than an arrow's flight, so there was little to fear if one stayed within a few steps of the forest.

The Wedic gathered in line, with Elder Dinesh scuffling to get into his chair. And there they stood waiting for the visitors to show themselves.

But they did not.

Seeing the sweat practically drip off of Adit's nose, Taysha was very thankful for her outfit now.

They continued to patiently wait until it had clearly past a full movement of the sun. Taysha started to shift on her feet when the councilman finally stood and, with great expression regarding the heat, walked back to the shade with his helpers' aid.

Taysha started to turn to follow, but noticed none of the warriors moved. She nonchalantly pivoted back into line.

"Lots of fun, huh Kid?" whispered Adit to Taysha with a quick look up at the sun, "The leaders get the shade..."

"Because he is weak," whispered Taysha, "Anami no in shade. He is leader."

"Heheh. Yeah. You understand," Adit sneered back as a drop of sweat fell off his nose.

But eventually even Anami saw the futility of their show of discipline and went to talk to Elder Dinesh.

They pulled everyone back to the shade and sent one of the young men over to the men still standing at the other end. He came back to say their chief was coming. That was all.

The sun was sitting above the western mountains by the time there were signs of their visitors' arrival.

The noise of men busily cutting branches and bushes caught the Wedic's attention. Eventually the unseen group broke through revealing a small, but clear-cut path. Anami was up and ordered his men, and woman, into position.

The runner that had returned to the village earlier had obviously told his people of the councilman's chair, for no sooner had the path been cleared than six men came out carrying three chairs. They had obviously been put together quickly, and it gave an awkward feeling. Were they trying to copy the Wedic ritual? Were they trying to out-do them?

They were placed about a rockthrow away from the forest edge, with the larger one positioned higher than the two on either side.

The Council took to talking in low voices among themselves at the action. This would make the issue of where the meeting would actually be held a possible problem.

"We'll arrange to meet in the middle and bring the chairs there," Taysha heard Elder Dinesh say as he walked out into the field and back into his seat. And there they waited and watched once again.

The foreigners across from them continued to spend their energy hacking away at branches and brush. After more than a few mutterings from the Wedic questioning this people's sanity, a distant cry from a trumpet was heard. It was a deep long sound of a great bronze trumpet. The sound came and went as the trumpeter inhaled and blew, inhaled and blew. As the sound got closer, it was joined by other instruments.

"We should have thought of that," whispered Adit.

Taysha noticed Councilman Dinesh was impressed as he excitedly chatted back and forth with those standing beside him.

" _At least don't look impressed, you idiot,"_ Taysha cursed at him silently. Even with his admitting being wrong, she still couldn't bring herself to actually like the man.

When the parade came into view it was led by young women dancing in one-piece white tunics with white cloth pieces wrapped in their hair. Their hair colour was lighter than Taysha's black hair but otherwise they were obviously closely related by race. After looking at the Wedic faces for so long, the women's features looked almost strange to her.

"Those must be the virgins," Adit whispered loud enough for the surrounding group to hear.

Taysha sneered, not really knowing why.

The dancers were followed by older women dressed in similar fashion and carrying poles decorated with leaves, cloths and flowers. The poles were joined together by long white cloths on each end, making a tunnel through which the three most important people of their tribe emerged in a most magnificent fashion.

They were riding horses.

Having never seen the animals, Taysha's eyes rounded as if in a daze. They were just as Anami had described: big deer. It was then she realized she knew what they were, if only from tales of her people. The Amazoi called them the Hairless Bears. And it looked to her it would take more than three arrows to bring down such a beast. They amazed her. Moreover, the thought of a beast that could be ridden was incredible in itself.

Her eyes locked on the elder of the three men who came first. He was dressed in leather armour and had a copper circle on the grey hair of his head. His grey beard was braided, reminding Taysha of how the men of her own village used to fashion their beards. Behind him a young woman rode in the same white cloth as the others, only with gold trim and a purple overcoat. She also wore a copper ring on her brown hair. Taysha thought she was most likely the first man's daughter or wife. The last man in line looked like what Taysha would describe as a warrior-councilman, much as she would picture Anami if he was sitting up in the shade with Elder Dinesh.

The three dismounted one after the other in front of the chairs and took their positions without much ceremony. Behind them walked their honour guard. Yet they didn't walk like normal men. They stepped at the same time and moved very close to each other. They filled the empty space to the left and right of the important seats and the band and the women stood behind them with the draped poles perfectly spaced between them.

"Oh!" cried out the Councilman over the din of the music, "How impressive!"

He clapped his hands in approval with the smiles of the Council members. This was much to his liking. This was apparently his idea of the kind of respect and honour a Council should receive. But Taysha, and every one of the warriors who stood with Anami that day, felt their hearts sink into their boots.

Taysha had no words in her language to describe the armed men opposite her but she knew the Wedic did. They were more than a group of warriors. _These_ were soldiers. Groups of men trained for only one thing; war. They were obviously led by one man and moved in one thought. There was far more of them than necessary for a simple honour guard.

The funny thing she noticed was the small axes in each one's sash. It was another similarity with her own tribe. Instead of the long curved knives of the Wedic, the axe had been the most common weapon-tool of the Amazoi.

For Taysha, the outcome of this meeting had already been decided. It was quite clear what the grey-haired man had come for. He had come to receive homage, not to make partnerships. Yet she stood unmoved and emotionless with the others staring over at the group, who now stood staring back at them. The music stopped and the silence that grew in its stead gave Taysha an uneasy feeling. It was like the feeling one gets when not receiving the answer to a question. The Councilman shifted in his seat as the others across the field sat solemnly.

Out of the corner of her eye Taysha could see Elder Dinesh look back and forth, making animated gestures.

"Oh? Ooooh? Hahaha, well I guess we didn't plan this part out, did we?" his comment was met with nervous laughter from among his members.

"Shut up you old fool," whispered Adit, "Can't he see?"

Taysha looked over at Adit knowing he felt the same way she did, but the sight of him looking ahead, expressionless, helped her regain her composure. She could hear Elder Dinesh give his order as she looked to the front.

"Send a boy over to suggest we meet in the middle."

"You, boy," one of the Council members standing at the end pointed to a runner, "Go suggest we meet in the middle."

The boy looked up with questioning look, "How ... ?" he started but was cut off impatiently.

"Use your head, boy. Gestures. Use lots of hand motion," he emphasised by waving his hands around in the air.

Adit muttered something indistinguishable under his breath, but his disapproval of the entire situation was made clear enough.

The boy took a few hesitant steps and then started jogging out over to the line of armed soldiers. The imposing sight of the man on the highest seat was enough to make Taysha want to cry. She couldn't imagine what the boy was feeling. She was sure she could see him shaking from where she stood.

He waved his arms in the air in over-gesture as he spoke. His escapade was met with a sigh from the highest man and a few snickers from his soldiers. The brazen warrior-councilman looked around and, on seeing his chief's unimpressed reaction to the messenger, yelled out something to those around him.

There was no answer to his question. The elder in the highest chair stretched out an open palm towards the boy with a curled lip as though he had been offered rotten food. Taysha could see him growl something before flipping his hand at the boy, indicating he was to leave quickly.

The boy looked back towards the Council members looking on in anticipation. He then looked back to the one in the highest chair and held out his hand towards him and then towards the middle of the field as if to offer his hand in escort.

"Brave boy," Adit muttered.

The three sat there looking at him coldly as though he was just a slug. Taysha could see his trembling hand before he dropped it to his side. He even looked to the soldiers for any sort of help but saw mostly sneering bearded faces. The boy started walking backwards to get away. After a few steps he turned and ran as quickly as he could and the warrior-councilman stood and shouted. At first it seemed like he was addressing the boy, then it became clear it was aimed at the Wedic Council and, most likely, to the only Wedic councilman sitting on a chair.

The general mood of the man yelling back at them made for a very nervous contingent. Without understanding, there was no way to know how to react accordingly.

The one difference in the group was, once again, Taysha. When the ranting of the angry man had reached their ears, all the Wedic heard was angry babbling. But to Taysha's ears, there was something else.

She heard, "Blah-blah, yell-yell BOAR! Blah-blah, yell-yell GREAT Blah-blah..." At this point she thought it could just be her imagination.

There just wasn't enough to assume she understood.

It _was_ common in her tribe to call someone a pig, or pig-fucker, as an insult, and though the word "great" did match his hand gestures towards the older man in the chair, she wasn't too sure.

Then she heard "maggot," a word she used often herself. Coming from the man pointing towards the Wedic, it convinced her she understood. She felt excitement in hearing words she recognized and moved forward without thinking. As she stepped forward, she caught the words, "cock" and again "great" something-or-other.

No mistake. She understood that arrogant _cock_ across the field was yelling insults at her friends and getting away with it because no one understood.

" _Putting on a show for your chief, ei?"_ she thought as her strides became a run. Both sides stood silent at the sight of this half-armoured young woman making her way angrily towards the other side.

"Oh gods, she's going to kill them," Adit said and stepped forward to catch Anami's eye to see what they should do. But Taysha stopped on a larger rock and at the top of her voice yelled back with pointing finger to the now silent man. First she spoke in the language of the Wedic people so they would understand.

"You insult my friends and family. You think we don't understand!?"

She then changed to Osfer, the language of her people.

"Cocks! Maggots! Pigs! Shit! Pig-fucker cunts!"

The tiny figure shouted defiantly towards the opposing side and pointed to them with her spear, much to the sudden interest of the silently sitting chief. The big eyes of every man and woman standing across from her told her they understood words of insult.

It seemed they did share common words after all.

"Yes, dirty cunt!"

She directed her spear point at the bold one who had since been silenced, "Maggot! Cock! Shit eater! Boar! Pig fucker! I'll take your chief-great-whatevers and shove it up your ass. You dirty, stinky asshole!"

The man stood with his mouth open in utter disbelief as he was torn in two by this little woman in her play-armour.

Although not all of her words were understood, the first two definitely were and it was made clear from the start she had come to throw insults at their faces. And all they could do was look back in awe as she cursed and stomped her foot at them.

Adit couldn't contain himself any longer and he let out a cheer. It was quickly followed by the rest of the warriors, and the running boys, and the assistants. It was all to the dismay of the Council members. But the cheers softened as Taysha continued to yell. She yelled until the sound of her own voice bothered her and she stood silently calculating the distance to run back to safety and wondering if any of them would make it back the village alive.

Then a quite unexpected thing happened. It was the sound of laughter. It drew her attention to the man sitting on the highest chair. He sat rocking back and forth on his ass as he laughed and shouted to all around him as he pointed to Taysha.

Taysha stood fuming, knowing he was making fun of her, until she caught another word she recognized.

" _Tabiti?"_ Taysha thought, seeing the man pointing right to her, _"He means Tabita! The Goddess of Fire."_

"Yes!" she yelled back, "I am Tabita!" she yelled again as she hit the fist holding her spear across her chest. "I am Tabitiiii!" she roared and opened her eyes as wide as she could.

Taysha was suprised to see a few of the soldiers across the field actually stepped back, but the larger portion did not. The man in the middle chair stopped laughing.

"Oh?" he called to her as he leaned forward in his chair and pointed to her, "Tabiti!?" he called out to her, then proceeded to blabber away at her.

Taysha didn't like the way this was going. She felt the power leave her face and her will to fight. It was being sucked from her by the man in the chair. Every laugh he made emptied her all the more. She didn't know what to do. She wanted to run back to the tribe. No one was coming out to help her. She couldn't blame them.

"Tabiti! Tabiti!" the man called, making Taysha realise she had let her gaze drop. He yelled back with motions towards his warriors then sat back with his arms crossed.

She didn't know if he was bragging about his power or challenging her to destroy them. The nervous looks of some of the men indicated more of the latter. As far as Taysha was concerned, the conversation was over. She huffed through her nose and threw up her hand that was holding her spear in defiance as she shot her chin up at him. The warrior-councilman looked to his chief in dismay. The old man wiped his face with both hands as he looked blankly across the field to those standing opposite them. His councilman started barking orders that made Taysha jump. The two lines of soldiers on each side of the chief were re-arranging themselves in front of their leaders. Taysha, wide-eyed, turned and stumbled her way towards her position in the ranks.

"This is it!" shouted Anami who had already formulated a plan since first seeing the armed men appear, "Spears to the ground! They have no bows! Use your bows until they are within spearing distance. May the gods be at your shoulder!"

"Gods at your shoulder!" the men chorused.

The unified call sent a chill down Taysha spine as she was still scrambling to get back to her line. She dropped her spear as she ran and it fell over onto Adit. The undignified result of her panic was thankfully ignored and Taysha joined the others with an arrow at the ready.

But the volley was never fired. After proceeding about a stonethrow from their chief, the leader of the opposing force halted his troops. The chief sat looking extremely calm as he listened to his captain's whisperings. Though obviously not afraid to fight, it was also obvious they had neither bows nor shields. The chief also seemed not foolish enough to lose thirty or more of his best warriors on an impulse. Without noticeable word or gesture, he stood and his horse was brought to him. When he and the woman mounted, the warrior-councilman stood and took a moment to stare, apparently right at Taysha. When he too had ridden back down the freshly cut path the women followed while the warriors started to step slowly back to the safety of the forest.

When they too disappeared, Elder Dinesh exploded.

"You stupid, stupid girl!" he yelled at Taysha as he stepped out of his chair and fumbled with his robes.

Taysha held her head down in shame, when to her surprise, Anami shouted even louder.

"You over-speak yourself, Councilman!" he yelled from behind him, "Those men did not come to bargain! They came to demand! Don't be the fool you accuse others of being! Of all our warriors she was the wisest and bravest to act quickly against it!"

The Councilman wheeled around in anger, stopping the procession behind him and waving his finger towards Anami. Anami did not stop walking as the Councilman started to voice his strongest opinion and when the Master-of-Arms had reached the foolish old man he struck him hard across the face with the back of his clenched fist. Dinesh fell to the rocky ground with a grunt. Anami stood in the silence as he looked around for opposition. But none of the Council members spoke.

Blood was dripping from Elder Dinesh's mouth as he recollected his wits.

"You ... you..."

He stopped and raised his hands to protect himself as Anami stepped closer and grabbed his symbolic and precious robe of authority and wrapped the loose end around his neck.

"If you speak again, until this is over, I will end your ceaseless babblings forever. Do you understand?"

He gave the cloth a yank in emphasis.

"Grgg h yus. Syesyeus..." came the choked response.

"Good. And don't think I won't do it," he said as he released the man and turned to address those around them.

"By the decrees of our people!" he shouted, "I call a state of war in which the decisions of Council... and village law... are under the control of the Master-of-Arms and his appointed deputies. Under this law, those who oppose me will be counted as traitors and strangled until dead. This decree will be honoured until either the peaceful or warlike solution is reached between us and our new enemies."

He looked around at everyone to collect his thoughts.

"Any who oppose me?"

Much to Elder Dinesh's dismay, there was not one voice to be heard.

\- - - - -
The new hut of Council was now Anami's father's hut, which he shared with Anami and his wife. A few of the more level-headed of the Council members were included, as the first priority was to ensure a unity of the people. Anami mentioned to the Council members he would answer for his striking of Elder Dinesh after the threat of war had been settled. Until then strategies and the defence of the village took precedence.

Young Panit had heard talking about trying to set up another meeting with the tribe and volunteered to deliver the message. He had been quite thrilled with his participation in the whole event and looked forward to another adventure.

Even so, Anami and a couple men who were more in favour of sending no message at all. But, the small chance the event could be worked out through diplomacy was deemed worth the effort. After all, the threat of war or living under the constant fear of being attacked was where they stood now. It was this reasoning that Anami reluctantly agreed to and the boy, full of excitement, took their latest hand-drawn message of many mad faces looking at a yelling girl in armour, followed by two equal groups of soldiers meeting happily, each with gifts of cloth, furs and foods.

This time Panit ran off alone, as he felt he could get there and back faster without anyone to slow him down. Through the night, Adit and Ariya --Anami's new lieutenants-- had organised sentry rotation and enforced sleeping times when those who were resting were confined to their huts to keep them from staying awake talking to others. Drink and Smoke were forbidden as was going anywhere alone or unarmed. Taysha had the honour of being included in most of the meetings. Even her limited knowledge of the unknown tribe was deemed useful and besides, after her display of bravado, it would be insulting not to have her among them.

"The biggest question is..." stated one of the older men on the war council, "do we wait for them to attack and defend ourselves? Or attack them? Or meet in the middle like two armies?"

"I would vote for waiting here and defending," answered Ariya, "If they did the same, there would be no war. If they attacked, then we would be ready."

"I agree with Ariya," said another man.

"That would be fine," said another, "but they live in our main hunting grounds and winter will be upon us soon enough."

"True, but, perhaps we could make an agreement that we can use the grounds together, without hostilities."

"Would you want to go hunt in the valley with them there?" Anami asked.

The look of dismay answered the question for all of them. There was no chance of sending a hunting party down to where an organised group of armed men might lie in ambush.

"Well, at least there weren't many of them," one of the older men stated. "Couldn't be more than fifty of them."

"Thirty-two," answered Adit over his shoulder, "There were thirty-two armed men."

"That's what I counted too," confirmed Anami, with a proud look at his student.

"Do you think that was everyone?" one asked, "After all, we didn't bring everyone ourselves..."

The question brought silence to the hut.

"We shouldn't proceed with any plans of attack until we know for sure," answered Anami and turned to the girl who sat silently in the corner with her legs pulled up to her chest.

"What do you think, Taysha?"

"I think defend is best," she said simply, with her chin resting on her knee. She knew from her mock training how quickly a man or woman could fall in battle. She was quite hoping the visiting tribe would just move away without incident.

The final decision was to start improvements on defences in the morning by adding runners at the top of the ravine, a constant schedule of scouting parties, sentries around the village, and building a fence across the openings to block the avenues of attack.

Taysha made the change into the full armour and helmet that Adit had loaned her. Though she didn't feel particularly attractive in it, there was no doubt she felt safer.

\- - - - -
Anami was already faced with an anxious mother asking where her son was. Though the boy's mother knew he could not possibly return in three days, it made Anami's stomach turn and he sat confessing his worries to Taysha at the central fire as they rested.

"What will I do if they kill they boy?" he asked, thinking out loud.

Taysha knew he wasn't expecting a response and she sat with him quietly. The dark thought was soon pushed aside as a group of people came for advice on the expanding wall.

Taysha looked down at her blistered hands. She had been working along side the men since early morning two days earlier. Cutting trees, sharpening ends, digging trenches, and drawing tight the hemp rope that held the posts firm. The geese and sheep pens had also been moved closer to the center of the village, and valuable metals and stones were buried under the floors of the huts. Bajesh's parents' hut was one of those on the outer circle and Ushi and Wada had a small space in the corner near the new wall.

After the wall was finished, Taysha, Ariya and Bahrat started teaching their newly learned skills and tactics of group fighting to the others. They took groups of four men and simply explained the basics. Those who had trained with them over the summer were divided up among those who had no idea what was happening.

"That's right. That's right!" Ariya said as he pranced alongside one group, "If you're both doing it correctly, you should swing around like a dance. Keep tight. Back spearman, strike and pull, strike and pull. Not just 'strike' 'strike.' You need to get that spear out of the way so you don't trip your own men."

Bahnu had brought Shaymo down to see Taysha at the field below the Training Grounds where she was spending her days instructing the others. Taysha only had time to hold her daughter close to her forehead for a couple breaths before returning to her duties.

The memory of the thirty-two men frightened her. They weren't stiff as trees, and they moved and stood in equal spacing and equal timing. Taysha figured it must have taken a lot of time and training to be able to do that as one body.
" _How do you control the minds of thirty men?"_ she asked herself as she looked at the groups that practiced in front of her.

With every nervous heartbeat, she wanted to use the time she had left to get away with Shaymo, Bahnu, Bajesh, and the wolves. They could pack up as much as possible and head back over the mountain pass from which she came. The waterfall above the low wide valley where she last saw the lone wolf would be a great place to live forever.

"Are you all right?" Bahnu asked.

Taysha stood a moment as all the thoughts she had flooded through her, "I'm so sorry."

"Why?" asked Bahnu.

"I don't know. What I did. Say bad things to foreign men."

"Don't worry, Taysha. You are the chosen of the gods. It will be well for us all."

The thought of losing any of them ripped at Taysha's heart. She nodded as she hid her look of concern and returned to her waiting group for training.

At sunset one of the scouts who had been stationed at the ravine path came running up towards the Training Grounds where Taysha and the others sat eating.

"Where is Anami!?" he yelled in panic.

"Up at the Council hut," someone answered back calmly and the man ran off towards the village, "The _New_ Council hut!" he yelled after him.

"What's happened?" yelled Ariya.

He stood from the bench and watched him run out of sight. Ariya wiped the crumbs off his crotch and started running after him. A large group of men rose and followed.

"Hey, wait! What are you all doing?" Taysha barked at the running mob. She wasn't the only one angered by the scene.

"Back to your _glek_..." Adit started to yell, but choked on his mouthful of bread.

"You!" Taysha scolded in his stead. Her confidence regained as she pointed to two of the men who had stopped to look. Adit was now coughing and spitting his mouthful of meat and bread out on the Training Ground.

"You two! BACK to your post!"
The words of the phrase was not clearly understood by Taysha, but she knew what reaction was expected after constantly hearing it being used by Anami or Adit.

The men were flighty and undisciplined. Even though Taysha was inexperienced in war, she could see how dangerous it was. Had the messenger run by with word of attack, all the sentries would run after him only to find too late that they needed to return to their positions.

" _Idiots,"_ she thought as she stood up and started to wave back those of the men who were hesitating.

"Back! Where Anami tell you to be!"

The men walked back quietly, looking like boys scolded by their mother. And scold them she did. They got an earful as they came back. She kept asking them what would happen if everyone ran into the village when they were attacked. Adit, being able to breathe, used his first breath to stop Taysha.

"Don't scold like a woman, " he said with a smile, not missing the irony, "Say your point, or hit them. That's all the language you need."

Taysha took her instruction with a little pout, but she stopped her chattered chastising. Adit, knowing well the position she was in, smiled and took another bite of his food.

Before he could finish his mouthful, Anami and a large group raced down the hill.

"Adit, you're in charge of the village!" Anami yelled as he ran past and across the grassy field and disappeared into the forest to the ravine path. Adit gave Taysha a pat on the shoulder to indicate she was in charge of the Training Grounds, and ran back up the hill to the village.

"Get everyone in position!" he yelled back as he rounded the corner. Taysha looked around at everyone looking expectedly at her. Most of them still had food in their mouths.

"Wayu! Bahrat!" she shouted, "Get groups in line. Here."

She motioned with her hand to make a straight line of three groups. Everyone dropped their food and drink and picked up their weapons in an impressive display of discipline. Taysha's plan was that if they were attacked, the ridge of the Training Grounds would help in defence, while enabling them to get behind anyone trying to move up the path to the village.

When they were properly spaced apart, Taysha stood on the path at the edge of the Training Grounds looking down at her army. Apart from the nervous tension of the unknown situation, it made her feel pretty good.

Anami eventually came back into view. Most of the group that had gone with him still remained somewhere in the forest. Beside him, Ariya was carrying Panit on his back. The boy messenger who had left over five full days ago looked to be in a great deal of pain. Taysha and the others stood in silence as they held their ground. Everyone, that was, except for Panit's brother. Taysha said nothing as he broke rank and ran to Panit, wiping the sweaty, matted hair from his face as he walked alongside Ariya. Panit looked as if he had been beaten and Taysha noticed one of his boots was missing.

They disappeared up the trail to the village, and Adit made his way back shortly after.

"Back to training," he said to the war-groups solemnly. Without a further word, he went straight to his groups and continued working with them.

When they had been formally excused from their duties, Taysha went back to the village and knocked on the guarded Council hut.

"Come in, Taysha," Anami said quietly at seeing her face nudge through the door. He sat with Father and three other older men.

"We were undecided on whether we should show you this but you're here, it's here ... you might as well see it."

He handed her a parchment scroll of a kind of very thin bark and held it to the firelight. Anami sat, lightly running his fingers across his forehead as she looked at it. It was a crude caricature of the tribe's leader with an over-sized cock, taking a naked Taysha from behind with other bodiless cocks in her mouth and cumming on her head. Just below it was another drawing that was unmistakably her again in her armour. Her arms, legs and head were separated from her body and red dye stained the parchment.

"They raped the boy," Anami said when she looked up to him. "He won't talk about it but it's pretty obvious by the blood." Anami's lips suddenly shut tight, and he stared into the fire.

Taysha sat quietly, her eyes darting around the pictures in her hand. "Where is boy's father?" she asked.

"He was patrolling the eastern area ... Up near your camp. He's been brought back. He's at the hut too." Anami took the scroll from Taysha and threw it into the fire as he changed the subject the best he could,

"The intentions of this tribe are obvious. They're savages. We will have to fight them like we would fight a pack of wolves ... with our lives." the others nodded in agreement as he continued, "Tell everyone in the village. Tell them everything. I don't want them to enter this without knowing fully what we're facing. Ah!" he started to reach towards the burning parchment, now seeming to regret throwing away the proof of their savagery, but it was too late. "About the scroll, about ... well, if they can do that do a boy we can imagine what they would do to our wives and daughters. Go now. Make sure every man and woman knows the fate that awaits each one of us if we fail."

The men filed out as Anami motioned Taysha to stay.

"How is the training?" he asked. She had to swallow back the overload of information to speak.

"Good. I think is easy tactic to understand and learn. Most difficult is move together in circle but everyone do well enough for only one day for practice. Do you make us into groups of four for war?" she responded.

"I was thinking of it. Something like this..." He leaned over to the dirt near the fire and drew dots on the ground. "If each dot is one group of four, that would mean an archer in between every space. I think the best advantage of this set up would be ... the indecision created for the attackers. Do you understand?"

Taysha lightly shrugged.

"At the Talks, the man leading their warriors forward stopped and went and went back to talk to his king, right?"

"King?"

"You don't underst ... uh, a king is like a chief ... uh, a man with more power than a chief. No council. His word alone is law ... a king."

"King," Taysha repeated the word so as not to forget.

"Anyway, I think that showed a level of indecision. Meaning, he could be confused easily. "

"I don't think he is fool," Taysha cautioned.

"No, nor do I. I will not make the mistake of underestimating him. " he added with a look to Taysha.

Taysha nodded in agreement as Anami continued.

"We, on the other hand, have more-or-less trained hunters." He lost his enthusiasm in the truth of his statement for a moment, "Anyway, what I was saying?"

He brought Taysha's attention back to the little map in the dirt between them.

"If we're spaced apart like this, the commander will be forced to make a decision. Attack in force, against one group of four at a time, or split his force. If he splits his force, does he put four on four? Or try to overwhelm each group at a time by making eight or ten against four? It really doesn't matter, because they won't have time to practice. Their soldiers will constantly have exposed flanks no matter what they choose. If we tell our groups to use all directions, back, forward, left, right, the front ... a few who are attacked could draw the enemy into a crescent shape as the flanking groups moved around them."

Taysha understood less than she let on. She sat nodding to everything Anami said and switched between looking where he pointed on the map and into his eyes. It was evident he was speaking more for his benefit than hers anyway. What had she really done to deserve the honour to be in his council alone?

Anami caught her gaze and in that brief moment Taysha realized she had been staring at him. Before she could react he had placed his hand on her knee.

"I will not let them harm you," he said softly.

"I know this," she said with a smile.

With a pat on her knee he nodded towards the door. "Now go work some more with the War Groups. Always ready to fight from now on, right?"

"War Groups," she repeated the new phrase. "Yes, Teacher," she replied, feeling a rush of blood to her face.

"Also, I'm having Hrat ... Ariya's father ... I'm having him make some proper armour for you as well. Go see him first so he can get your body shape."

\- - - - -
Early next morning the War Council met.

Soon afterwards, Taysha was sent out right away with Ariya, Adit and Bahrat to with all the Wedic warriors to practice as War Groups of four members.

Amid the organising in the field, questions about the tactics to be used were constantly being asked.

"What if they bring bows? It could turn into a day of volleying arrows back and forth," one of the men asked.

"I don't think they're the type," Adit answered with his usual nonchalant shrug, "But from what I felt from looking at them, they would have been quite happy to run across that field at us, arrows or not."

His over-confidence started to bother Taysha and it seemed she wasn't the only one. The War Groups soon divided between those wanting questions and concerns dealt with and those who were telling them just to trust their leader. The former, ended up with Taysha. In her experience, she knew that blindly trusting a leader is a stupid, stupid thing to do but she offered her advice without any unspoken bad feelings. The men were doing that enough for her anyway.

"Most of our shields aren't big enough to handle a constant flow of arrows."

"Just trust Adit. He's got things under control."

"Oh, does he? Then why bother putting on armour at all then? Why don't we just ask young Adit here if he would kindly send the intruders away?"

"Disrespect to him is disrespect to Anami."

"I hardly think Anami would ignore our concerns."

"If we're just going to stand here in the field until they run out of arrows, I don't know. Doesn't sound too good to me."

Amidst the commotion, one of the older men stormed off towards the village. He waved off any attempt to call him back and he muttered something about Anami as he went. Soon Ariya and Bahrat were simply trying to calm the situation and Adit had resorted to challenging several of the others to a fight.

Unfortunately, it was a challenge a couple of them were more than happy to accept and Adit stood his ground as a yelling match ensued.

By the time Anami and the man who had gone to fetch him appeared, the majority of the group were holding back the others from fighting, while those not wanting to be involved stood off to the side.

"Excellent. Excellent," Anami exclaimed sarcastically, and started applauding as he approached. The big, obviously over-exaggerated smile was unnerving to say the least. Hands that were gripping their comrades by the armour loosened and they stood quietly waiting.

"Adit, come with me," he said simply while turning around and walking back towards the village.

"Yes Teacher," Adit replied and exchanged a final look with his most aggressive challenger before hurrying after his mentor. They walked out of hearing and Anami quietly talked to Adit. Adit simply stood with his eyes at the ground while nodding in agreement.

Without so much as a glance at the others, Anami suddenly turned and walked back to the village while Adit returned to the group. Though he kept his eyes on the ground as he approached, it was obvious Anami's trust and authority lay completely in him. The clarity of that fact settled the atmosphere.

"What else can you think of?" he asked the group through clenched teeth as he re-entered the circle. There was no acknowledgement of any wrongdoing, yet he wasn't as confident as before.

Taysha couldn't help feeling embarrassed for him. Thankfully the others had wisely chosen to put aside the conflict and went back to asking questions and making suggestions. Ariya, Bahrat and the older men helped keep the conversation focused on one thing at a time.

"I'm just thinking it's obvious we need to choose a better place of battle," one man said, "I just don't like the fact that we're only practising in the open field so close to the village."

"Why not?" questioned Bajesh's father, "It's close enough where we can sleep properly, eat properly and not succumb to the demon's pranks of twisted ankles or other injuries a group can sustain walking through the woods."

His comments were met with murmurs of approval.

"Can't be ambushed here either," added another.

Taysha found the opportunity to say something,

"We maybe add women ... armed with bows and arrows," she suggested.

In the silence that followed, she explained, "See, if women stay on Training Grounds, is higher land. We keep them... um, they protect us from out-flanked."

"How could they..." one man started asking with a sneer.

"Bows, obviously." Adit answered forcefully, as if not appreciating the man's reaction to Taysha's idea, "Fifty good women and children with bows. That's a lot of arrows to fight through."

Out of all the comments so far, this one seemed to have the biggest effect on the group. They stood looking at each other.

"Good idea," Bahrat said finally, looking over at the Training Grounds, "I think you're right, Taysha. It's a wide enough space we can use this strategy without the trees blocking our arrows. The archers could be the biggest lever in this."

"And we wouldn't have that much support if we fought in the forest or somewhere far away."

Taysha knew the man who had first agreed with the idea. He was Natu, one of the men who had regularly come out to help her and Adit with their combat training that summer. She had come to like and respect the thin, thirty-ish year old man. He listened more than he spoke, something she admired in a person.

"All right, all right..." Ariya interjected, "We're venturing into things that we don't need to think about right now. The fact is that Anami has a tactic he wants us to practice. He's put me, Bahrat, Adit and Taysha in charge. Follow our instruction. Then when we're finished we can sit for a meal and discuss ideas to improve. Agreed?"

Mumblings of approval and nods of the head were the replies. Bahrat clapped his hands and started shouting for them to get to their places. Taysha gathered Bajesh, her Spear Wielder, Wayu, her Left Shield and Napan, her Right Shield. As she stood waiting for everyone to get ready, she recognised the cleverness in Anami's tactic of control by not addressing the problem directly. It was something she would remember for future use.

\- - - - -
After the next few days of practice, the obvious problem became whether the hostile tribe would even bother attacking at all.

Taysha had been getting more and more frustrated at every autumn leaf that started to turn. Not being included in the War Council so often lately, she didn't know what Anami was planning. He started having all the War Groups practice moving quickly together in straight lines across the field or around in the forested areas. Taysha thought it was a clear sign that he and his higher commanders were planning to bring the fight to their enemy. The only question was when?

She and her friends wondered why it was taking so long to make a decision to attack. Taysha had started thinking that Anami was just waiting for the snowfall in hopes the other tribe would just move away in the spring.

The only good thing about the wait was that Hrat had time to complete Taysha's armour. Hrat had the idea of forming the wet leather over her modesty armour to give her a more feminine shape and to provide her with armour that wouldn't squish her breasts. She received her hardened leather breastplate, helmet, battle skirt, arm, leg, and shoulder guards four days later. The leather was thinner than usual with only one layer, and there were no decorative designs, not to mention the helmet was nothing more than a leather wrapping around her head with flaps to protect her ears, cheeks and the back of her neck. It was obviously a rushed work. No wonder, as every spare man was working on the larger rectangular shields that Taysha's group had designed. The moment she saw it she wanted to just kept using Adit's old armour. She tried to hide her disappointment by giving a forced smile to everyone when it was presented to her. She was however, happy to find the helmet was too tight. A perfect excuse to use Adit's more decorative one.

She promised herself that she would have someone teach her how to make armour when the war was over.

A couple of days later, when the War Groups were inside the village walls having their evening meal, the problem of how to deal with the opposing tribe was solved for them all. A scout from the ravine ran to the group and reported to Anami that their enemy's warriors had massed at the foot of the ravine path.
Presumably, they would make their way up in the morning. That meant they would be at the top before midday the next day.

"They came with horses," he reported, "Six of them anyway. More than we would like to handle in an open field," he suggested, "Oh, I should mention there are a lot of them. A lot more than thirty," he added with a wobble of his head.

"Well, how many would you guess then?" Anami asked, showing a small degree of impatience with the man's poor report. There was a noticeable feeling the scout was enjoying everyone's attention more than concentrating on his prime duty.

"I would guess a hundred, give or take a handful. A little less maybe..."

Anami turned white and his expression went blank.

Echoes of the number were whispered around the group. If it was true, the Wedic warriors would be outnumbered almost two to one. Unless one counted the women and older children covering their flanks from the Training Grounds, then it made their numbers almost even.

"What weapons did they carry?" Anami choked out.

"Uh, the horse soldiers..." the scout started.

"How many archers were there?" butted in one of the men, who received a stern look from Anami and an elbow into the side of his armour by a friend.

"They ... archers? Uh, I would say thirty? Maybe..." the scout answered then paused to think. Murmurings broke out among them until he continued, "They, uh, mostly had spears, long ones, and shields. Uh, I think all of them had shields. Even the archers. Probably swords too. Sorry I didn't see clearly. But the archers were more lightly armoured. Like us."

His comparison of the Wedic being like the "light-armoured ones" sent a feeling of dread around the circle.

"What do you mean, _like us_?" confirmed Bahrat, "We're 'light armoured' compared to them?"

The scout had caught on to the general mood of the group. He wasn't enjoying the attention so much now.

"Uh, I think ... I mean it looked like the men from the Talks ... the ones who were the honour guard of sorts ... It looks like they are the ones at the front of the line. Some have metal armour..." the volume of his voice started to wane.

They had metal armour and almost twice the number of archers. It seemed all was lost before it began.

"They all carried swords or hand-axes and shields," he started over, aware of the darkening mood, "and I'm sure those behind them were armoured differently and either bows slung on their backs or javelins. Maybe a mixture of both. I'm sorry. I couldn't see them all." The scout started to repeat himself.

His voice trailed off, echoing the uncertainty they all felt.

Anami raised his hand to quiet him.

"So, a hundred men or thereabouts."

One of the Wedic openly covered his face with his hands in despair. Others sighed or scratched their beards. Taysha just stared into space, trying to imagine what a hundred people in armour even looked like.

"If we surrender," the words of Anami snapping the attention of everyone back to him, "some may be spared. Better than if we lose outright."

He left the suggestion before the group of men and they sat in silence for a moment. Most of them were just stunned from having heard the words come from Anami. As they looked at him, it was clear he was only confirming their commitment to fight. Soon the entire group was shaking their heads or murmuring "No."

There would be no surrender.

"After what they did to the boy," said Father, "I doubt they would be merciful to us or our women."

"I agree," said another.

"As do I," said yet another, "It would seem better to die in battle than be stripped of our weapons and murdered as they rape our families before our eyes. You were right, Anami, when you said they have not come to barter, but to demand. We must put all hesitation aside. It is happening as we speak and we must meet it full on."

His words were met with nods of agreement.

"Very well," Anami answered, "We will spend our time stopping as many of them from reaching the top of the ravine as we can before having to meet them in the open field. Especially the horses. Our main priority is killing them. A dead rider can be replaced, a dead horse cannot."

Anami slapped his hands on his thighs and stood.

Everyone placed their bowls of stew or drinks to the side, tightened straps on boots and armour, put on helmets and started organising in their War Groups.

By the time Anami and his army stood at the edge of the field readying themselves to head into the forest, another scout arrived from the ravine with the latest news. This time the report was a little more dutiful and competent.

"They have dismounted and are walking the horses up the path. They've sent most of the metal-armoured, shielded men to walk ahead. All at front have metal armour. At the rear of the line are the archers. I counted 98 men altogether. But there are single scouts all over the hills. Mostly boys. With thin armour. They've already spotted us ... the scouts, I mean, so they're coming cautiously but quickly. If they don't stop they'll be at the top before nightfall."

"Rest and return to watch them as soon as you can," ordered Anami in mid-stride. "Adit, Ariya, Bahrat, Get to your groups. Taysha, go back and join the women at the Training Grounds."

Adit was already a good two paces ahead of her before she could think through the shock of what he had just said to her. She cleared her head quickly and ran after him.

"No, sorry, I cannot," she replied, almost running to keep up to him. Anami snapped his head around towards her as though he was going to yell but Taysha beat him to it.

"My War Group," she cut in, "We practice this three months. We know movement together. Movement of War Group. Why you ask me to leave my War Group now? Who is my War Group archer now then? Is not good ... not good strategy. Sudden changing... We work together. Know how we moving. I better archer here. Not on hill. If I..."

Anami raised his eyes to the sky as he clenched his fists.

"All right! All right! Gods be bothered, Taysha, I have no idea what you're on about," he cut her off, "You stay together. But, by the gods, you and your War Group will stand on the battlefield where I place you!"

"Yes, Teacher," Taysha replied matter-of-factly. She found the thought he would suddenly question her position among the men rather insulting. She caught Adit giving her a smile and a wink as they scattered to their respective groups.

As they ran on towards the top of the ravine, Anami had a change of plans. He stopped the contingent and sent the Shield Bearers and Spear Wielders back to the field to mark out the positions of each War Group. This would give them all an established main defensive group to retreat to. All the archers of the groups would now be able to empty their quivers into the oncoming army while they were still in the ravine. When they had no more arrows to shoot, they would run back to the field to where their War Groups stood waiting with a fresh supply of arrows. That would also give them time to rest behind the safety of their men. Anami had no illusion they would be able to inflict such damage on the invaders as to actually stop them, but he was determined to kill the horses at least.

They lined up along both sides of the crevasse and waited. Taysha thought it would make more sense to keep the archers along the ravine with the Shield Bearers making a wall at the top of the path to keep the enemy from climbing out. It seemed a more logical tactic but she kept quiet. She knew she was lucky enough to be the only woman standing among the men in the first line of battle. Still, she had been positioned at the end of the ambush and was doubtful she would get a chance to shoot anyone. Beside her, about a stonethrow further in, stood Anami. He had told her to stay beside him as he felt she was safer when she was near him.

Her ears strained to hear the approaching enemy but the wind through the trees was the only sound she could catch.

Taysha remembered she had tied half her arrows in a bundle so she would not use them all up. She took her quiver off her back and undid the leather string that bound them. She sat back against a tree and waited.

It wasn't long before she heard the first sounds of war.

\- - - - -
The familiar twanging sounds from the bows of more than a dozen archers echoed from the end of the line. Instantly, shouts in two languages rolled across the forest like thunder, spreading in waves. The clamour of the first assault of men as they dashed for the top filled the air. Taysha stood wide-eyed and staring at the end of the trail, waiting for her first target to appear. She noticed Anami and those on the opposite side of the ravine had started making their way closer to the front of the ambush and Taysha followed after them. She kept the properly trained distance from Anami, though the others were already bunching up at the cliff's edge, shooting rapidly into the gully below.

It was obvious the arrows from the Wedic side were too few and too far apart. Conversely, Taysha could see those of the enemy at the end of their line seemed cover ground with surprising ease. The ambushers on both sides of the ravine quickly found themselves the defenders as they positioned themselves behind trees while shooting at the running mass of metal. Not long after Taysha fired her first arrow at her first enemy, they were quickly in danger of being passed by completely.

Among several pierced legs and arms of the enemy, the greatest achievement was spooking a horse that had caught an arrow in its cheek. After pushing several men into the river at the bottom of the ravine, it had reared up and fallen on its master, crushing him up against the rocky cliff. The animal proceeded to kick the horse behind it in the chest and began a chain reaction of men scrambling to get out of the way of the beasts and the flying arrows. Like a finger running along delicately hanging water drops on a branch, the motion sent men falling in succession to the river below. It was unfortunate for the Wedic the fall did not kill any of them but it did give those on the opposite side of the ravine a better chance of hitting them as they tried to scramble back to the top.

A random arrow hit the rampaging horse in the head and brought it down with the others, restoring a resemblance of order for the attackers. The leading footmen pressed onwards and were now dangerously close to the top of the plateau.

Taysha felt the rush of fear as she saw the others loosing their arrows too quickly as they retreated.

The rapid advance of the enemy sent a couple of the archers running for their positions in the field before they had finished shooting their quiver of arrows.

Taysha, Anami and the three that had been at the very end at least had the luxury of being able to walk backwards as they fired to cover the retreat of those at the far end. Taysha saw people running all over the forest now. There were enemy scouts, that had obviously climbed the cliffs, mixed in with the Wedic. Her heart pounded in her ears as she shot, retreated, stumbled, reloaded and shot again. At one point she saw her arrow almost hit a man in his face. It had just skimmed his ear as it flew past and he turned his head instinctively at the pain. But with a small check at the damage with his gloved hand, he quickly rejoined the others in their advance.

A feeling of complete horror swept over Taysha at the sight. These men would not stop until either they or the Wedic were dead. Seeing Anami's steady and emotionless retreat was the only thing that kept her from running away as a wall of metal and shields filed across the top of the ravine.

She could see a group of four Wedic men scrambling towards the northern mountains. They had no arrows in any of their quivers and had been cut off by those who had reached the plateau. One of them had been hit with an arrow and was being helped by his comrade. From this distance, Taysha couldn't tell who it was. She thanked the goddess that Bajesh was her Spear Wielder, somewhere safe on the field.

"Back to the field!" Anami yelled and the retreating party started to increase their distance between running and shooting. Taysha ran back past whoever stood shooting. She pulled out the next arrow as she ran. When she had it on the string, she stopped, turned and checked for a target while waiting for the others to run past her. Then she shot and ran again. In that time the men that had passed her were repeating the pattern. Those from the opposite side of the ravine had joined them and now about ten of them retreated in an orderly fashion towards the end of the forest.

Taysha suddenly let out a laugh. She was elated. The emotion confused her momentarily until she realized why.

The thrill of how they could all work together without having even discussed the tactic of retreat overwhelmed her. She was in a battle. A real battle. Fighting for her life among the men. Her head reeled as if she had been Smoking. At moments she wondered if it was all just a dream or if she was reliving a memory of a past life, when she was a man from the tribe known as the Wedic.

When the wall of shields had stopped pursuing them, Anami gave the order to turn and run at full speed towards the center of the field. Taysha broke out of the forest laughing. She wasn't alone. Cheers and shouts of encouragement went up from their War Groups already scattered around the field, followed quickly by the women and children gathered at the Training Grounds.

There was a moment of confusion as each of the archers tried to find their respective War Groups. Taysha found hers two groups to the rank-right of where Adit's held centre position. They were part of the line to the back on the right flank of Anami's group. Taysha wondered if Anami had arranged the set up or if Adit had done it. She didn't think it was a smart layout. All the lieutenants were in the centre. In their days of practising, they had been spaced out evenly. She dropped the thought and looked over towards the marsh area to see if the men she had seen running towards the north mountain would appear. There was no sign of them. They had probably decided to keep heading up the mountain. Their climb would be harder with one man injured. And without arrows, it was a safe bet not to expect them to join the coming battle. That would mean four War Groups without their archers.

"Bring down the guards!" Anami yelled at Bahrat who stood on the left flank of Anami's waiting group, "The flanking guards!" Anami repeated, pointing at the two War Groups standing on either side of the women. "We lost two groups in the forest!"

Bahrat nodded and ordered a runner over to give them the message to move up to the flanking sides. As the last archer was getting into position, the four that Taysha had seen escape to the north came into view behind the marsh at the edge of the clearing. The sight of them sent another cheer through the relieved people once more.

The flanking guards that had come to take their place looked over to Anami for instruction but got none so they remained in their new positions. The four archers made their way around the marsh and a handful of enemy scouts appeared at the forest edge behind them. They took a look at the War Groups standing in the field and ducked back into the trees, letting their prey escape.

"Lucky bastards," Wayu commented on their close call but Taysha was too busy catching her breath and re-stocking her quiver to answer. Sweat dripped from her face and her stomach felt as though she had been eating rocks. So far, the whole thing was like trying to remember a drunken night only it had just happened moments ago. Taysha tried to control her breathing, more for the sake of not drawing attention to her nervousness than anything. Her armour felt as though it had shrunk around her and she thought she would throw up at any moment.

The understanding that the battle was far from over weighed heavily on her mind. She looked over to Adit and his group and the long pole with cloths of different colours that waved silently in the autumn wind. It was planted in the ground behind them to mark the centre of the line. She recalled how she thought it a rather silly idea. After all, how could you possibly lose the center of a group? But after her experience of the confusion during the ambush, it was the first thing her eye caught when she left the forest.

" _All right,"_ she thought, noting Adit's cool appearance and tried to calm herself, _"If they all attack in a line, they're still only attacking ... what? Half our force? They'll engage the front line and we'll sweep in and give them the furies, just like Anami said. But we're so far away from each other, we won't be able to hear each other and if the enemy runs between us and gets behind us..."_ She turned to scan the distance between the War Groups and the women and children behind her. _"That's good, I guess. They'll be pinched in between us, then. But what if they don't run through and stop and make a circle around us? The women won't be able to shoot at them with us mixed up like that. Gods be damned, Goddess, protect me."_

She could feel her legs tire but the sudden image of how they all had retreated out of the forest in proper order helped to settle her.

She heard running behind her. Anami had obviously made another sudden decision and was leading his War Group past her and towards the right flank.

"Anami?" shouted over Taysha not really knowing why. Her voice relayed the fear she was feeling. Anami only raised his spear hand at her as he ran.

"It's okay, Taysha, relax," Bajesh said calmly, "We'll do fine, thanks to you."

Suddenly a shout from Anami echoed across the field.

"LOOK AT US! Our first attack and we have only ONE injured man and he is safely back at our village! We have no doubt killed many of them! Take heart! In the end we will be victorious. Look to the safety of your group first, and in claiming it, seek the safety of your neighbour!"

Anami's three lieutenants led the others in shouts of support, offering praise and telling them all would end in their favour. Taysha quietly looked back at the women and children on the knoll of the Training Grounds. They stood, shuffling nervously. There were no sounds of exaltation from them. Half of them looked as though they would faint. Even Mother, who was in control at the worst of times, looked deathly pale. Somewhere at the back of them was Bahnu, holding Shaymo and probably praying to her gods.

Taysha wondered if she should have listened to Anami and been with them. Her eyes dropped as she felt she may be thinking that only because she wanted to get as far away from the coming battle as possible, rather than actually help.

"A little of both," she admitted to herself in a whisper.

"Enemy!" shouted someone from the War Groups on the left flank. She followed his pointing finger to a leather-armoured figure in the shadows. He stood a brief moment before darting away. Another scout. Fine.

It was clear they would have to get this started before the sun set, which wasn't long. The Wedic had been fortunate the enemy hadn't made it to the top earlier when the sun was in the Wedics' eyes. Now it had dipped behind the western mountains, leaving the sky a soft, even light. The cold had started creeping in and most of the archers kept their shooting hand in their furs while they waited. People kept moving from foot to foot in a mixture of nervousness and cold.

Another great fear swept over Taysha.

" _What if they don't attack today? What if they attack at night? Oh gods, damn them. Then what?"_ Before the horrid scenarios could be played out in her mind, someone started shouting.

"Archers! Archers!"

Peering into the darkening woods, they could see the archers of the enemy spread out along the forest with a shielded soldier as their guard.

"Just as we practiced!" yelled out Anami, and Taysha moved close beside Bajesh, as they huddled behind the two Shield Bearers.

Napan turned back to Taysha, "You know, I wanted to be an archer," he confessed with a little smile.

"Watch out for angled shots!" Adit yelled from their left, drawing their attention back to the enemy. They were too far back from the woods for the archers to get a good shot them but you never know until someone is hit.

'Thwack! Thwack!'

The sounds of the first shots echoed from the centre group. Taysha didn't see where they had come from or where they had hit but the hard-hitting sound made her question whether they had been arrows or just one of the Wedic hitting his shield with his sword.

"Damn me," whispered Wayu as he looked over.

Any doubts Taysha had on the origin of the noise were soon settled.

'Thwack! Thwak-thwack-thwack!'

The sounds ran up and down their front groups until a particularly loud hit came from Wayu's shield.

"DAMN ME!" he yelled as he recoiled slightly at the impact. The group instinctively huddled closer together.

"This could be trouble for our strategy if their archers stay there when they attack," Napan commented over the growing noise of arrows hitting their targets, "They'd pick off all our archers."

"They won't be able to shoot with their men in the way," Bajesh replied but his voice lacked conviction.

No sooner had Bajesh spoken than the left Shield Bearer of the War Group to their right collapsed on the ground.

He was alive and kept holding his shield up to protect the archer behind him, leaving him open on the ground. His comrades quickly huddled around to cover him and they became the focus of the next few bursts of arrows. He had been shot in the foot. Taysha couldn't help feel more vindicated than pity. The man had been warned from the beginning to use a rectangular shield instead of the round ones. But he, like many others, had decided to keep their rounded ones, a decision they were now regretting as they crouched on one knee behind their chosen protection.

Taysha's ears picked out Anami's voice over the commotion. She couldn't tell when he had started yelling. "Archers! All our archers! If they attack mind their arrows! Stay behind your group the best you can! The gods at your shoulder!"

His command was met by a few repeats of "The gods at your shoulder," along with a few frightened nods and a couple of "What did he say?" from the far left flank. Some hadn't even heard him yelling at all.

Taysha had seen an easy target in the woods and without thinking, stood and released her arrow. The brave attempt was one of the few from the Wedic side, but like the others, it fell short. It wasn't anything that raising the angle of her next shot wouldn't fix but she noticed the enemy had been holding their arrows parallel to the ground while shooting. And they were hitting the Wedic just fine.

"Why their bows so strong?" she asked aloud to her group. "They hitting our shield so strong. I cannot even hit straight my target." She moved in close as the retaliation to her attempt pasted her group with a fresh volley of arrows. Both Wayu and Napan had wisely placed their rectangular shields on the ground at this point and the four packed in behind them. Taysha shook her head in dismay as she pulled back on her bowstring as if to check if it was faulty. But she knew it wasn't.

It was a bad situation to be sure. They hadn't counted on so many men in the first place. There was actually closer to an even number of the enemy archers for every Wedic warrior on the field.

The sound of thunder made her look up. The clear sky seemed out of place for a moment but she had more important things to worry about than the oddities of weather.

The mystery was soon solved as she saw three of the hairless bears the Wedic called _horses_ come running out of the woods at full speed with men on their backs and the metal-armoured men running behind. The riders wore more elaborate armour with colored clothes and animal skins. They aimed the line straight towards Adit's group in the dead centre but suddenly veered off towards Taysha's. Taysha's eyes rounded and her breath left her. It was either their tactic to split the force down the middle or they had seen Taysha and were set to get her first. Regardless, the leader soon found himself crushed under his own horse as Taysha's arrow found its way to the exposed throat of his war beast.

She had no intention of shooting the horse. She had actually been aiming for the man riding it. An arrow flew right past her face and she ducked down behind her shieldmen. As she fumbled at notching her next arrow, she replayed the shot in her mind. She spat out a mixture of a laugh and a sob at the rush of emotions. Just when she got her arrow set, she felt Wayu forcefully pull her away. The two remaining horses were almost on top of them already. The speed at which the animals covered the ground was like something from a bad dream.

As she stumbled she could have sworn an arrow flew right past her again. It obviously missed them both, for Wayu kept her moving towards the centre line to force the horses to turn to get them. Wayu's quick thinking had saved her life. The momentum of the animals was too great to allow them to make a quick turn and they were forced into a wide arc. This momentary relief soon ended as the effectiveness of the combined attack of the horses, foot soldiers and the archers was proven. The Wedic centre line was now caught in close combat with the metal-armoured men. Adit's group had been pushed back to Bahrat's and those on the left flank were forced to move to their aid.

Arrows were flying everywhere now. The Wedic archers finally had their first targets and were shooting over the top of each other to fell the horses or the mass of men on the field. It unfortunately made it an easier job for the enemy archers as well. To add to the confusion, the horses had passed by Taysha's group and ridden right through Bahrat's on the way back, smacking into him and throwing him into the air like a mouse.

Bahrat was lucky the rider was aiming his spear at his archer but he was knocked unconscious and his ankle shattered when the next horse stepped on it. The small compensation given by the gods was the rider of the second horse momentarily lost control and ended up riding through the centre of the fray, taking hits from the Wedic on one side as his horse bounced his own men to the ground on the other.

Adit and his group were fighting a losing battle against the main force of the foot soldiers. The tactics of the War Group were keeping them alive but it was only a matter of time before they were surrounded.

Taysha had been pulled so strongly by Wayu that when he released her to go to Adit's aid, she fell on her face. As she started to rise an arrow just missed her head and landed in the mud within her reach. Without a thought, she grabbed the bonus ammunition and scrambled back to her War Group which had joined in Adit's fight. She quickly preferred the feeling of safety provided by eight per group, rather than four. She and Adit's archer stood back to back as they shot at the enemy trying to surround them. Seeing the place safest from the archers was being among the enemy troops, the other War Groups quickly started joining the engagement.

Another horse fell as their two-man charge attempted to circle to the right and back on one of the War Groups on their own. The remaining rider ran through the approaching Wedic as though they were sticks. Taysha looked over with an expression of horror realising it was Father's group. But she didn't have time to pay more attention to it than that.

The lone horse and rider, dotted with Wedic arrows, circled wide and galloped along the grounds between the battle and the women. All the time arrows kept flying from the Training Grounds around them but the battle-hardened beast took little notice of the ones that hit, let alone the many that fell harmlessly to the ground.

At first, any action from the women had been stayed by the fear of hitting their own men, but the sight of the horse and rider out alone in the field had them jumping into action. As the rain of arrows surrounded him, it seemed the rider's tactic had changed from attacking to just being a distraction.

At one point Taysha looked over to the right long enough to see Anami and his group leap into the forest. In between her own shots, she stole glances to see what he was doing. The archer of his group was moving from tree to tree, shooting at the archers in the forest as Anami and the other two crashed through at full speed. This time there was a clear advantage to having the smaller shields over the larger ones.

Anami's sudden attack caused the enemy archers to lose their concentration and they began shooting at him and his small group rather than providing cover to their men engaged in battle.

Taysha was distracted by Adit falling to the ground beside her. He was holding onto a larger man, trying to wrestle the axe from his hand. Taysha fell on her knees right beside the two men fighting for their lives. She pulled her bowstring back as far as physically possible and shot her arrow straight into the attacker's temple. The man did not die right away as Taysha had expected. In fact, he still held on to his axe until Adit had shaken it from his grip. Taysha could hear the battle raging around her but she felt frozen. She was unable to stand or draw another arrow as she transfixed on the grotesque expressions of the dying man.

Adit snapped her out of her trance as he rolled the man off him and threw the axe away. He had no time to express his appreciation and didn't even look at her as he grabbed his spear and scrambled back up into position. Taysha wondered if he even knew it was her that had helped. She stood and backed away. Taking the time between loading arrows, she looked over towards Anami again.

An arrow had just hit his small shield, knocking him off balance for a moment. He stumbled but quickly regained momentum and ran right past the first of the archers without killing them. Taysha's scream of warning was in her throat as she saw the archers turn to shoot him in the back. But his speed and the trees made for a difficult target and the two men following behind were quickly onto both of them. A few of the enemy's foot soldiers on the field responded to the shouts of their archers and they returned to the forest.

The sudden action was perceived by their comrades as a retreat, and a pause of confusion lingered with those on the field.

Another arrow passing by her line of sight quickly brought her back to the battle and with it, seemed to awaken those around her.

She stepped out and away from the main battle.

"Indar! Indar!" she yelled at the archer in Adit's group. "Back and away. With me! With me!"

She could see Indar's hesitancy to leave the safety of the Shield Bearers but he knew it was the best tactic and Taysha seemed fine standing out there alone now that most of the archers in the woods were busy with Anami and Tapal's groups. He took a deep breath and ran over to her as she started shooting. She took one last look at Tapal tapping Anami's archer on the back as he ran past with shield high into the flanks of the enemy archers.

"Support! Shoot them! Shoot them!" Adit started to yell, pointing to yet another batch of enemy soldiers returning to the forest to protect their archers.

As the War Groups that were not engaged made their way cautiously forward, Taysha saw Anami leap into view of the path and showed clearly why he was the Master-of-Arms.

He had twisted his body sideways to let an arrow fly pass that had been loosed at him less than a stonethrow away. While the archer reached for his second arrow, Anami was onto his defending shieldman's throat with a single stab of his spear. The man instinctively grabbed hold of Anami's weapon, to which Anami simply let go.

As he continued forward, he pulled the curved blade from behind his shield and sliced across the back of the man's neck and left him grasping at his lifeblood. Continuing the motion, he lunged forward and extended his sword tip right into the chest of the archer. The man dropped like a wet cloth.

And that, Taysha noted, was how to kill a man.

Anami crouched, with shield over his head as enemy archers shot at him. As they fumbled to replace their arrows, he had already taken off at an angle to his next victim as those from his War Group overpowered those foolish enough to hold their ground.

It was at that moment Taysha knew they had won.

\- - - - -
When Anami and the others returned to the field, he found the two opposing sides in a kind of stand off.

The War Groups stood in a semi-circle around the still standing horse and rider and the bloodied survivors of his once-great army that had gathered around him. This final assembly of defiance had been joined by six or more of the archers who had fled to the battleground during Anami's attack and a mixture of about twenty or so of the metal-armoured and leather-armoured warriors. They had formed a circle holding shields ready to defend themselves and their leader. Though very few of the War Groups still had a complete four-member team, they were spaced out evenly just as they had been taught.

The Wedic women were either in a group standing in mid-field with arrows at the ready or were scattered around the battleground already helping the injured. There were two or three of them wailing beside unseen bodies in the grass. It was a terrible indication they had not come so close to victory without cost.

There were boys delivering arrows to the archers, handing out water flasks to the War Groups and setting oil lamps and fires by the Training Grounds.

Taysha watched as Anami and the others ran over.

She almost screamed when an arrow rushed by his head from the direction of the dark forest. It sent Anami and the rest ducking for cover in the open field as they put their shields up between them and the archer's view. Anami knelt and pulled back on his bow. Taysha didn't think too much of until she noticed two more bows on his back. One was his original bow and the second was like the one he held. It occurred to her Anami and the others had taken them from the fallen enemy archers. Unlike the long straight bows of the Wedic, they were shorter and curved. They almost looked like someone had squished them down to a more compact size. Taysha started looking anxiously as Anami returned fire on the lone archer in the woods. She wanted a bow like that too. Their obvious advantage in power had been more than proven.

"We have to get Napan."

Wayu's voice coming from behind her tickled her ear.

"What?" Taysha asked, genuinely confused as she looked around, "Where ... where's?"

"Shot in the hip," Wayu answered as he walked away from the stand-off, "He'll be fine. Other than the pain."

Taysha stayed where she was, looking around in a daze. She had absolutely no recollection of Napan being hit.

Ariya, acting as the senior commander after Bahrat, had decided to hold their position until Anami returned from the forest. And so they remained as Anami, once more, took off after whoever had shot at him. The day had turned to dusk without anyone really noticing it. One of the downed horses was still alive and making a raspy, crying sound. Taysha had started to go over to shoot the struggling horse in the head but was called back by Adit. She hated the sound it made. It was more like the noise a deformed baby would make in some sordid dream. It was too unearthly a sound for her to bear.

Anami returned to the field and made it back to Ariya. His Shield Bearer had been hit in his sword arm by an arrow but walked on his own strength and stayed with the groups instead of heading back to the village for aid. He simply sat on the ground grimacing while a friend pushed out the broken shaft from his lower bicep and applied a tourniquet.

Anami was greeted with a flask of wine and one of water. He took large drinks of each and handed the flasks around as he listened to Adit and Ariya fill him in on the silent remnants of their standing attackers. Anami made his way into the circle of War Groups and motioned to the man on the horse to come and talk with him.

The man on the horse was unnaturally calm considering his situation. He dismounted and started walking over bravely on his own. When he removed his helmet, Taysha was disappointed to see it wasn't the man who had hurled insults at them the day of the Talks. Taysha didn't think the balding, rough-looking man was even at the Talks from what she could recall. As Anami tried to convince him to have his men give up their weapons, the man pursed his lips and pointed back to where Taysha stood and made the motions for "breasts" and "come over" and pointed to her once more.

"He wants you," Bajesh whispered, now at Taysha's side.

"Hmph," she answered without much thought. She had no fear Anami would just hand her over to these people. Still, there was something not right with this man's eyes.

They weren't fearful or hateful, nor were they vengeful. They were simply purposeful. He gave the impression he would take Taysha and cut her throat like he would a goat.

Anami looked back to see Taysha standing nonchalantly looking over at them. Anami turned back to the man.

"No," he shook his head.

The man made a face like Anami was a pest and annoyance. He looked past him and yelled at Taysha.

"Tabitiii! Tayna!" he motioned her to come.

" _Tay na?"_ she repeated in her head. _"I suppose that's tay-ser? Come here, ei? Similar words again..."_

She looked at the man in front of Anami for a moment. Without anyone offering instruction, she shrugged and started walking towards the two in the centre. Adit and Bajesh stepped in and joined her with spears at the ready.

"I don't trust this man," Adit said as they walked. "If all he wants is translation, you stand behind me and keep an eye on his archers."

Taysha nodded, appreciating their bold help. She didn't like the scruffy little man either. If he was anything like his chief, she didn't want to be within grabbing distance of him.

The stocky man looked up at Anami and screwed up his mouth as he returned his gaze to the approaching Taysha. She and her escort stopped about two jumps away.

The talk between them was about as fruitful as any of them had imagined. The short bulky man blabbered with motions until his message was clear. Taysha would come with him and the fighting would end. Anami cocked his head towards him mockingly with wide eyes and a smile.

"Let me understand," he blabbered back at the ruffian, "She go. You go. Bye-bye. We happy-happy?"

Although realising he was being mocked, the man replied as coldly as he could.

"Un," he said with a motion he would get the girl.

Anami laughed. He laughed as loud and as long as he could. For those of the Wedic who recognized the uncharacteristic display as a joke, they couldn't help but snicker along as well.

The barbaric horseman seemed to be used to this sort of treatment and he stood patiently and sighed in reply.

Anami, knowing there was no more to be said, just stood there and kept laughing until the man gave up and returned to the safety of his group and mounted his horse.

"Archers in the woods!" The cry came from one of the War Groups closest to the forest.

"Gods, will this ever end?" Anami said as the four of them walked back to their own line of safety.

They scanned the dark forest for signs of the archers but couldn't see them.

"Can I have one of the bows?" Taysha asked suddenly from behind Anami.

"Huh?" The request caught him off guard. Without taking his eyes off the forest, Anami quickly handed her the one in his hand and took the spare from his back for himself. Taysha shouldered her bow, that had really always been Bajesh's, and set an arrow to her new weapon.

Another call of _archers_ rang out and everyone followed the pointing finger to the far right flank. Ariya's orders to keep their eyes on the main group were now mixed with shouts of information about those still in the forest. Thankfully the surrounded group seemed to be waiting for help from the forest.

They stood eagerly waiting for their archers to do something before they moved. Taysha caught sight of three archers running from tree to tree. It didn't look as though they had a plan of any sort.

The women and children were still in the field collecting weapons, helping the injured or mourning the dead. That meant they were in range of the archers in the woods. Again, it was looking like the start of a bad situation. Having seen three of them, there were surely more skulking in the woods. While Anami stood contemplating the options, the strangest thing happened. The horseman suddenly turned towards the forest and he and his soldiers simply started walking away.

The first question that went through Taysha's mind was what were they intending to do with their men who still lay dead and dying around them. The simplicity of their actions seemed to catch everyone off guard and Taysha and the others stood watching dumbly as the enemy continued walking closer to the War Groups that were caught between them and the forest.
Even Anami stood a moment with his mouth open until a scream caught everyone's attention. It stopped the horseman, his troops and turned the heads of every man on the field.

"Kill them! Kill them! Kill Theeeem!"

It was the mother of the boy who had been raped by the barbarians. It sent a familiar chill down Taysha's spine. She shivered as the memory of her dream so many years ago of the shrill, screeching bird and the head of her mother flashed through her mind.

When the woman could see no one would do her bidding, she ran forward and shot an arrow wildly in the direction of the retreating group. Everyone on both sides watched as the arrow seemed to slowly float over the head of the rider.

"Kill them! Please! Please!" she pleaded and sobbed as the men stood looking rather confused at the whole event unravelling before their eyes.

It was the action of Taysha that seemed to waken the men from the spell. She took a few paces towards the enemy group as she pulled back a Wedic arrow on the enemy's bow. The first release of her bow slammed an arrow into a wary man's shield. Now feeling the full power of this new bow, she quickly pulled out another arrow and shot again.

The horseman and his followers sensed their time of calm was over and they made a rush towards the three War Groups who stood in their way. Three men at the end of the group were left behind and quickly dropped their shields and weapons. It was unfortunate timing for one of them because he took an arrow in his forehead before his shield had settled on the ground.

A few arrows from the enemy flew out from the forest, only to be caught by waiting shields.

"Archers focus on that horse!" Anami shouted, "Attack! With me! Shields front and centered!"

He led the charge after the horseman and Adit, Bajesh and Taysha were left behind. The few enemy archers turned and started to flee before the horse and rider had even reached the forest edge.

After having waited for something to happen for so long, Taysha was blissfully swept away in the freedom of a clear mind.
Immersed in the feeling of adventure and thrill of pursuit, she felt the cold air on her face as she focused on loosing every arrow she could at the horseman until he disappeared into the safety of the forest. His life had obviously been spared by the gods and the last efforts of his exhausted steed. The last of his men were not so lucky. With the screams to _kill them all_ encouraging their progress, the Wedic felled all but two who had surrendered.

By now the sun was well gone and Anami reckoned they would need to hurry to make sure they got all the wounded off the field and holed up for a safe night. They quickly organised one Archer and one Shield Bearer to make a defensive line while the others were carried to safety. The pleas from the wounded enemy were ignored and they were left on the field to their fates. Taysha was happy to hear someone finally kill that damned wounded horse.

Of the original sixty-five men and one barbarian woman of his small army, Anami had twenty-eight seriously injured and eleven lost lives. Out of the twenty-six others who survived, only ten emerged without anything more serious than a few scratches if anything. Taysha and Anami were among these.

In comparison to the losses of their attackers, it was a great victory. And apart from jokes about the horses being their best allies, Anami's daring move into the flanks of the archers had most likely saved them all. But this was no consolation to the nine families who had lost a father, brother, son, or all three.

The father of the violated boy had also been killed, adding great tragedy to the surviving wife, the boy, and his brother.

Bajesh's armour had saved his life when he took two arrows in the side. He was in considerable pain from one of them that had penetrated to his ribs. Brother had also just made it through alive with several deep cuts on his hand and arm. There was a possibility he would lose the full use of his right hand, but it wouldn't be known until it had healed.

The worst of the family was Bajesh's father. Besides being bashed by the horse, Father had taken an arrow in his neck. There was nothing for them to do but wait for him to die.

Taysha, the family and Anami gathered in the hut to be with him in his final moments.
It was there Taysha first experienced the Wedic tradition of the Tale of Life. It was where the dying passed on all memories, good, bad, embarrassing and even boring to those who would remain in the present world. Bajesh later explained it was to clean the soul for its arrival before the gods and also to provide information for the living to help them make decisions while continuing their journey through life.

Father was in pain but his mind was clear and he took time to tell Taysha how happy he was to die having seen his granddaughter. He told Bajesh and Taysha to marry and told his precious wife he loved her and would always love her and he would be waiting for her most of all. He told Anami of his deep friendship. Most of all, he told Taysha that she had been chosen by the gods and how she had renewed his faith in them. He said he felt his meeting her was the most important event in his and his family's lives. Without her encouraging them all to train and practice, the Wedic would surely have lost the battle.

He then started to tell his family the hidden acts, thoughts and desires he had experienced in his life.

Taysha was greatly impressed with the honesty and lack of judgement during this process. Unfortunately, as one not directly related to the tales, and being one of the few left uninjured, Taysha was soon called out by Anami to help.

The two prisoners had been taken back to the village and tied up to stakes driven into the ground by the main fire. There they sat that night on the cold ground with their backs up against the short poles that held them down. Guards had been posted more for their protection than for the worry of their escape. Various women had come by to spit on them as Anami sat with Taysha getting as much information from them as he could. He at least found out they referred to themselves as the Kubu, or Kuba. It was a name Taysha hadn't heard before and though she tried, they shared few words in common that were useful. Anami also learned that Uros was their chief and they had come from the north. The most useful piece of information was that every warrior had participated in the battle. Anami wasn't too convinced of that. There had to be someone left behind to guard the village, and Chief Uros, who hadn't taken part in the battle at all.

After Anami had given up asking questions and left, the mother of Panit came at them with a knife but she was stopped and carried off to the edge of the village by one of the guards. The two stood arguing quietly before she retreated into the night.

The other women kept busy tending the wounded. There were crushed bones in arms, chests, feet and legs. Almost all of them had arrow piercings or cuts. One had a missing nose. Two had cut ears. Many of them had injured fingers, either crushed between shields or cut off completely.

There was also half of a cut hand and four arms that might have to be amputated if they didn't heal properly. There was a man with an arrow in his ass. He had been caught as he bent down to pick up his dropped spear. It would almost have been comical if it wasn't for the carnage around him.

Anami had posted five of the uninjured men at the main entrance to the village and Kala and several of the younger women to keep watch along the fence. The boys were used as runners. Everyone kept to their duties until they were told to do otherwise.

Taysha had been left to try to communicate with the prisoners. It was there she saw the sentry come by to report they could see someone in the field.

"None of our concern," Anami replied, "We have all our people with us tonight... alive and dead. All the valuables and weapons from the enemy are with us as well. Let him take what he can find."

He then gave Taysha orders to stand watch at the gate. She and Indar stood watching the lone figure walk in and out of the forest and back and forth among the dead enemy.

"I wonder where the rest are," Indar asked out loud.

"Their women come in morning." Taysha answered.

They were the only words spoken between them that night during their watch. They were deep into their own memories of the battle and pains of the aftermath.

When Wayu came to relieve Taysha of her duty she discovered there was nowhere to go.

Adit found her sitting and crying quietly outside Bajesh's family's hut. He had also been one of those who had escaped uninjured. For him, it was a clear testament to his abilities.
"How is he?" he asked her.

"Dying," she replied and sniffed.

She shook her head for lack of words, pulled her knees up to her chest and rested the side of her cheek on them. Before the words were found by either of them they were distracted by a call from Wayu.

"Adit! You had better come here."

Taysha was more than happy to keep her mind occupied, and she followed Adit to the entrance. They rounded the corner of the last hut in time to see it was Panit's mother. She was walking past the guards, holding a cloth sack about as large as a head. When she stepped past the first fire, they could see it was dripping blood. The front of her shirt and pants were covered in blood as well as the knife that was still in her hands. She was walking calmly towards the prisoners who sat, facing the fire, sleeping with their backs to her. The two guards stood when they saw her approach and Adit stepped up behind her and grabbed her arm before she could get to them.

She screamed with the full force of her lungs in the same horrible voice as she had used during the battle. In the dead of night, it brought people scrambling out of their huts.

"I HAVE MY RIGHT! THissss is my right as a mother and wife! LET ME PASSS! Let me Pass!"

Anami shot out from his hut as Adit was fumbling to grab the mother's arm that held her knife. Not wanting to add to their injuries the guards hobbled back and Anami called out for her to be still. As she stood there, the terrified prisoners who had been so rudely awakened, sat trying to see what was happening behind them.

"Take it!" she said curtly to Adit letting the bloodied knife fall from her hands, "Let me go!"

"Let her go," Anami commanded as he stepped closer.

The moment she was released, she stepped up to the prisoners and dumped the contents of the sack out over them. They were severed penises and scrotums taken from every man on the field she could find.

"My right as a mother," she hissed coldly into the first man's ear before spitting on each of the squirming men. And with that, still bloodied, she turned to accompany her husband's corpse and her two boys in her hut.

The village had since filled with sleepy faces of those who could walk, yet the only sounds that were heard were those of the squirming men, trying to get the severed members from off their laps.

Grimaced looks from the Wedic were all the assistance they received.

"Let them sleep peacefully in the company of their comrades!" Anami said loud enough to make sure the distraught mother and widow could hear, and he turned and went back to his hut to sleep.

The two guards looked at each other then stepped back to a further bench. One of them pointed to Taysha and suggested she feed the things to her wolves.

" _Good idea,"_ she thought and picked up the bloody bag left behind by the woman. She then went about picking them off the two obviously distraught captives. Her eyes met with of one of the men. Although obviously fearful, he appeared more collected and calm than the other. It was as though he had accepted his fate. Taysha looked back at both of them as she searched for the appropriate feelings she felt.

She felt nothing. Neither pity nor hate. It was like what she felt for, say, the village sheep that would be killed for food and their furs. She wondered if that was what that Hoorg boy with the bow had felt towards her. Was he completely indifferent to her that day? Did he still think of it now? He must. The real question was does he ever regret what he tried to do? The sad answer was probably not. No more than how she would feel if the woman had succeeded in cutting the captives' throats.

She returned her attention to daintily picking up the severed parts and she thought of holding one in the face of the more nervous looking captive. The unfamiliar idea of cruel mischief caused her to stand abruptly.

She looked up at the stars with a sigh. She was tired. She felt the looks from the two guards and hurriedly placed the remaining pieces in the bag with the others. She had counted sixty-four.

\- - - - -
The rest of that cold, late night was sleepless for most. If not injured themselves, the moans of the wounded or the cries of the widows and mothers echoed through the camp making it impossible to distract the mind. By morning they had lost two more men to their injuries. One of them was Father. That brought the total deaths to thirteen men. There was constant mourning and crying, pulling of hair or cutting it short in grief. The village hadn't experienced anything like this since the Last Ambush.

Bahnu cared for Shaymo as Taysha helped Mother and Grandmother take care of Bajesh and his brother in between her other duties.

The dead were wrapped from head to toe in their ceremonial beige cloths. They had been kept in the huts of their families and would remain so for two more nights, after which they would be cremated together in the field in which they died.

Group meals were constantly maintained at the centre fire to help the families concentrate on caring for each other. Taysha stood at the preparation table, periodically wiping her tears as she cut the meat for the newest pot of stew, when Anami walked by. He was checking on each family and at one hut had almost knocked heads with Councilman Dinesh as he was coming out. He had been crying, as most of the village had, although he lost none in his family. His son by marriage had been wounded, but he would live.

It seemed his tears were for his people. As he looked up at Anami, there was no room in his eyes for anything but sorrow. Anami found his own eyes welling with tears. The Councilman nodded in silent understanding and patted Anami on the chest gently as he walked over to visit the next family.

Taysha couldn't help noticing Councilman Dinesh still bore the bruise from Anami's strike. She stood motionless as she saw Anami's legs shake. He used the hut for support as he tried to make his way out of sight before crumpling to the ground and sobbing like a child.

\- - - - -
When the period of mourning had past, and it was certain none of the deceased would return from Paradise, the bodies of the family members were returned to the dust, purified by fire to prevent evil spirits who would come to use them. With the heaviness of mourning and the number of injured, there was no talk of funeral celebration.

Celebrating the passing of one man into Paradise is easier when most are not directly attached to the deceased. There could be nothing positive to think about at this calamity, so the ceremony ended with the great funeral pyre which lit up the whole field. The only dancing was that of the shadows of the surrounding woods and the only song was that of the fire.

By the third day it was obvious that this Kubu tribe would not be returning for their dead or their captured. Anami was torn between the protection of the village and having to solve this mystery. They couldn't leave the dead to rot in their field. Three days of cold weather had meant there was no hurry to remove them but the time had come to do something about it and he sent for Taysha, Indar, Antar and Natu. Antar was another large man like Bahrat. He wasn't necessarily Anami's first choice but Bahrat had a crushed ankle and Antar was one of the few uninjured. Anami knew all of them had spent the summer training with Adit and Taysha on the war tactics drills.

Although extremely hesitant about sending Taysha, he felt he needed someone who could at least speak a few words of the enemy's language. To be honest, he thought her as capable as any of his warriors. It was only his fondness for her that caused him to hesitate. Anami's instructions were to find someone to come and collect their dead. Because of the stealth and caution needed, he gave them three full days to get there and three back again. They all agreed it should give them enough time to creep as far as the encampment and run back if needed.

Before she left, she visited Wayu, Adit, Ariya and Bahrat. They were all disappointed they could not go with her. As she prepared to leave, Taysha found she was happy they couldn't go. Indar had followed Taysha's lead since the battle against the Kubu, Natu was easy-going and would always follow along with the first suggestion, and Antar usually didn't care either way.
The four of them packed their own food and an oiled cloth to sleep in or to use as a covering in case it rained. With a kiss for Bajesh and Bahnu, Taysha and her new group raced off across the field. They glanced at the already looted and dismembered bodies as they ran by. Some of them that lay further into the forest had been mutilated by wolves. There were signs that several of the wounded Kubu, having made it off the battlefield, only made it so far as to die in the forest.

As the four made their way cautiously down the ravine, Taysha found herself in front of the pack. She ran or jumped from tree to tree, keeping her eyes moving between the tops of the ravine, the path ahead of her and the river below. The three others kept close behind her. They all had their small shields on their backs for a speedier trip, and they wouldn't be able to easily defend themselves against a sudden attack.

Her pace slowed when she saw first-hand the devastation of their ambush. It was clear that the lay of the ravine and the hands of Fortune were largely responsible for their victory. Had half the men and horses lying in the river below made it to the battlefield, the Wedic would surely have lost. The Kubu's overconfidence and lack of caution had killed them all.

" _The decision of one arrogant man,"_ Taysha pondered as she walked slowly by, _"Like our village men who went to burn the huts of the Hoorg ... one stupid decision."_ '

"Ah!" she gasped suddenly as she stopped and pointed into the ravine.

"He! His ... him! That man!" Taysha pointed excitedly to the body of a pale-faced man with his eyes missing and his mouth locked open. He was dressed in finer garb than the rest and lay pinned under a horse, its neck grotesquely broken in the fall.

"It's loud man from meeting day. Who insult us all."

Taysha forgot her command of order and started scrambling down the ravine ledge.

Antar, the biggest and oldest took immediate command. "Keep watch," he said calmly and the three gathered where Taysha had gone down and stood scanning the quiet ridge above them.

Taysha got to the bottom and noticed a single fly leave the empty socket of the dead man's eye.

She stared closely at him in a controlled excitement. His horse had fallen on him, crushing him across the waist on the river rocks. She leaned over to his unhearing ears.

"Who's the maggot now, ei? Cunt," she whispered to him. She put her bow and arrow on the horse and withdrew the long blade attached to the back of her armour.

"Gods..." whispered Indar from his view from above, and caught the attention of the shieldmen beside him.

They looked down to see Taysha working hard to cut off the man's head. She was having trouble cutting through the spine and was trying to pull it off in short tugs by his hair. She even resorted to stomping at the connecting joint with her heel.

When Taysha had finished the deed and came climbing back up the ravine, she was huffing and puffing more from the struggle with removing the head than the climb itself. Her three comrades stood and stared as she approached. She plopped it down uncomfortably close to Indar's feet.

"There." she said satisfied, "We pick him up on way back."

"Pick ' _him_ ' up?" the usually quiet Indar repeated in a way that showed his distaste for the action, "Is this some fashion of your people?"

Taysha realized she had been smiling at them all this time and it suddenly became very awkward for her. She bit the side of her lip a moment as she looked down at her trophy.

"No," she answered simply with a shake of her head.

She then held out her other hand that held a jewel studded dagger and the iron end of his broken spear to show them.

"We should call people to come take things before Kubu people come," she suggested.

The sudden change of topic had the three men exchanging glances. But it seemed, although mortified by Taysha's actions, they were willing to put the beheading aside, at least for the moment.

"Sounds good," Natu replied, "But we'd better do what we were sent to do first."

Taysha rocked back and forth while looking at the men to make sure they weren't mad.

"Yes. Okay. Let's go quickly. Straight to Kubu village," she said as she put the dagger and spear tip away, "On way back we take some bows, yes? His bow is broke under horse. Useless." She pointed to her headless enemy below.

"Broken is good too," said Natu as he made his way cautiously around the head, "With a broken one we can see how they made them."

"Ahhhh, good idea," Taysha praised him with a slap on his arm as she ran off down the path.

The group met no guards or scouts along the way to the original meeting field. They noticed the seat of their own councilman had been torn apart. Across the field, the decorations of coloured cloth were gone but the seat of the Kubu chief remained.

The four had to skirt around the field in the safety of the trees and it slowed their pace.

"Uh," Taysha said quietly, "you know where is village?"

The other three stopped and crouched together in a circle.

"I thought you did," whispered Antar, "That's why you're in command, isn't it?"

"No ... No no no." she looked shocked, "I not in command. Anami not say I in command."

She looked expectantly at everyone. There was a large difference between her being able to manipulate them to doing what she wanted and her being responsible for the entire duty.

"You were the first to be called in to Anami's council," Natu replied matter-of-factly, "That means you're in command."

"What are we supposed to do now?" Indar added rather sarcastically, "Walk around until someone passes us?"

Taysha answered the remark with shrugged shoulders, pursed lips, and a little nervous laugh.

"They're obviously down river," Antar said, "And obviously close to the river."

"Why don't we head over to the field," suggested Indar, "The procession of the chief and all his men and flower girls and what-nots left a large enough trail."

"A good place for an ambush, no?" added Antar.

It was true. It would be the obvious trail back to their village and it would most obviously be guarded.

"What do you think, Taysha?" asked Natu.

She took a quick deep breath.

"If we walk in forest and miss village, we maybe walk around and around for many days. Because we are sneek'n secretly. But if we walk chief's path, we maybe find ambush."

She stopped herself from suggesting just going back. Returning to Anami without doing more than cutting off a dead man's head was not even worth mentioning.

"I think," she continued, "if we stay close, like War Group, shield front, shield back VEEry tight together and move q'ickly, we are safe. If we are ambush, then we move to left and run away to left. So, east," she confirmed, pointing to the mountains.

Natu confirmed what he thought she was trying to say: "Okay, so we run up the trail they made for the Talks in War Group formation. And if we're attacked we move into the forest to the left of us and keep heading towards the mountains as we fight."

Taysha shifted on her haunches as she nodded.

"Okay," Natu continued, "if we move at night, which it will be soon, and keep together like Taysha said, and don't speak, any guards we come across would have to confirm us either friend or foe before they started shooting arrows at us."

Antar and Indar nodded in agreement, as did Taysha.

"Sounds good to me," said Natu, "The gods have spared us but a few scratches. It would be a mistake to wander aimlessly."

"I agree," added Antar.

"Okay?" Taysha questioned Indar.

"Yes. It makes sense to me," he answered as they rose to their feet, "And I think if we use the path, we'll be more on guard constantly. At least, more than stomping about in the forest talking to each other."

"Okay then," Taysha said," We go to path entrance. Check for ambush there and if there is none, we rest until night. Then run down path."

They continued using the forest for cover until they had circled around to the back of the Kubu chief's chair and there they sat and ate and drank in the safety of the forest shadows.

It was most definitely autumn now. Although it was slightly warmer in the valley than up on the ridge were they lived, they could feel the cold of winter creeping its way in around them. Soon all the leaves would be radiant colours and then gone for another season.

Taysha knew she wouldn't get her revenge on the Hoorg that year. The reality that there could be survivors of her village at the Hoorg all this time seemed to hit her in the stomach. She felt she had wasted three winters, drinking, smoking, fucking. The thought of her people having to endure another winter before she could get to them weighed heavy on her. But for the moment, she had to put aside the burden of not being able to rescue them and she refocused on her duty.

When the colours of the sky turned to grey they gathered at the end of the trail. It was easy to follow. They had even cut down small trees. It seemed the Kubu had intended it to be their main path to receive the gifts of gold and iron from the Wedic, if that was indeed what Chief Uros had been demanding.

The path took them straight along the flats of the valley. It was farther than they expected and when they reached the end, they stumbled upon the settlement in the darkness. At first they all thought it was just a field and they made a rush for the opposite side to find the continuation of the path. It wasn't until they had gotten half way across before they noticed the abandoned fire pits, the scattered firewood and the rings of stones that lay around them. In the odd quietness, the party of four spread out as they looked around. It seemed a few tanning frames were the only structures left until Natu found a tall pole in the middle of the field. It was held up by a pile of rocks and was decorated with scraps of furs and black feathers. To add to its ominous sight, a stake about the height of a man was placed beside it. And on it sat a head.

It was quickly recognized as the balding head of the last remaining horseman who had asked for Taysha on the battlefield. The four scouts stood cautiously beside the grisly message and scanned the field and forest around them.

The Kubu had gone.

The light creeping over the eastern mountains revealed the abandoned camp to the four who had retired to the safety of the forest edge.

The light showed a much larger village than their own. The men guessed the Kubu were twice the size of the Wedic population. Or, it _had been_ , at least. After a quick search, they found nothing worth collecting and decided to head back to the ravine quickly to grab what they wanted for themselves before the others of their tribe got to the corpses.

They left the darkly decorated pole and severed head where they were, hoping the disconcerting feeling it provoked would serve as a warning to other passers-by.

The distance back was covered quickly and they found themselves at the meeting field before midday that day.

"Should we leave this?" asked Natu as they walked up to get a better view of the chair.

Chief Uros's chair was fastened with braided rope and polished branches with simple carvings of deer and bears on the handles and back. It was too impressively done for a day or so worth of work. It had most likely been done after their meeting and was either forgotten or abandoned.

Taysha climbed up to sit in it and surveyed her kingdom of rocks and grass. She looked down at the three with mocking raised brow. Memories of the day of the Talks drew her imagination to what Uros must have seen when Taysha was standing alone in the field, hurling insults at them all. She smiled as she picked out the distant rock on which she had stood.

Suddenly the idea of why the Kubu had so hastily absconded came to mind. Perhaps they really did think she was Tabita, the Goddess of Fire and Destruction. It was the only logical explanation why none of the women came back for their men. Perhaps the chairs...

"These are gifts," Taysha said out loud as she ran her hand over the armrest.

"What's that?" Antar asked.

"I think these are gifts. For us," she repeated.

Natu stepped closer and touched the chair.

"It would be great to carry it back to the village," he said, "but there would be a fight over who gets to sit in it."

"I would think it would be Anami," said Antar in a firmer tone, never quite the delicate one with politics.

"There would be the start of the fight," cautioned Natu. Antar only shrugged.

Taysha liked the idea of presenting the chair to Anami as a gift and she pondered the action as she sat in the symbol of authority. A strange thought passed through her mind. As the commander of the group, she had the right to make the decision on whether to bring it or not. She couldn't help feeling that it was now her, and her alone, who held the future of the tribe in her power.

The gift of the chair would force Anami to accept it. How could he not? It would be the excuse he needed to maintain total control of the tribe. Control that was already diminishing as the 'war' had now come to an end.

Taysha couldn't stand the thought of the Wedic returning to the squabbling, debating tribe they had been less than six days ago. Anami had brought an unconditional unity to the village. And she knew she wasn't the only one who thought so.

"Why don't we just leave it here for now," suggested Indar, "Anami can decide what to do with it later. Besides, we need free hands to bring back some of what we find in the ravine."

It sounded the best thing to do and they took turns in the chair as they stopped for rest, toilet, food and drink before heading on. Every moment another sat in the chair, Taysha couldn't help but think them unworthy.

They had decided to camp near the base of the ravine as they hadn't slept for two days and they had one more night before they were expected back at camp. They slept without a fire in pairs back to back just across from each other. Taysha thought she wouldn't get much sleep with the combination of excitement of what she might find among the bodies and nervousness about being followed in an elaborate ruse by the enemy. She found herself waking sometime in the night shivering. She pushed farther into Natu's back and he woke.

"Cold?" his experience of married life told him without really having to ask.

"Yes," Taysha replied and shivered.

Natu rolled over and put both their sleeping cloths and his leg and arm over her.

"Don't tell my wife," he joked and let her fall asleep in his embrace.

It was well past morning when Antar woke first.

Taysha caught him looking at her and Natu snuggled up together. He simply rolled his eyes at her and went back to taking his food from his pouch. His movement woke the others and they sleepily stood off to the side to relieve themselves before joining the group in the middle for breakfast. No one talked. The fatigue of their adventure had caught up with them in the night and they sat about yawning. When it looked to Antar that Taysha was going to fall asleep again, he stood up.

"Let's go and get some treasure," he said

"What is ' _treasure_ '?" Taysha asked sleepily.

"Things of the enemy," he said simply with a smile and swung his rolled cloth over his back.

Antar didn't bother waiting and was off and running while Taysha was still tying on her sleeping fur. It was a good hearted race between them all to get up the ravine and to the awaiting spoils of war.

Half way up, Antar's bulk started to work against him and he was overtaken by Natu and Taysha. When they were in danger of running out of sight of the others, they would stop and rest until the other two caught up. They followed this pattern until all four of them got to the site of the ambush. Taysha and Natu lay panting on the ravine path, exchanging the odd look and smile while they waited for the other two now pushing on their thighs at every step. By the time Antar and Indar had joined them there wasn't much time left in the day and they quickly started searching the first body.

He was a spearman with an arrow deep in his eye socket.

They took the arrow, his spear, dagger, helmet and the gold chains from his neck and the earrings. Natu took the leather gloves and his fox fur collar. The small bag of some type of repugnant cheese was left behind.

The armour was valuable to Taysha but she gave up trying to take it off him when she saw the others jump from body to body, grabbing gold and jewelled pieces and bows and smaller weapons.

For the remainder of the day they concentrated on those first few bodies in the ravine. Besides the bows, the best finds were the jewelled daggers. There were also small sacks of gold, colourful rocks, and fine crafted leather armour pieces.

All of them had dried foods such as smoked meats, fish, berries and mushrooms.

Taysha had stuffed her war belt with gloves. Around her neck were wrapped cloths and gold necklaces. On her arms piled one bracelet on top of the other until she could carry no more.

Besides the disappointment of not being able to take more and having to decide which to drop in favour of picking up the latest find, there was a lack of bows. It was most likely because the archers had been at the end of the ambush and had returned fire, thus keeping them alive at this point of the battle.

Even so, by the time they had reached the top of the ravine, they had two bows each. Including The Insulter's broken bow that Taysha went back down to get. She also took the decorated bridle from the horse and a gold and jewelled ring from his finger that she had missed seeing in her struggle with his head. She stuck his head on his broken spear tip and walked with it held up in front of her, much to the dismay of her troupe.

When they came up through the forest and into the field that evening, the crows that had been feeding off the dead took to the air in an impressive display. The sight of the four warriors coming back across the field with a head on a spear had the guards send for Anami.

Anami didn't know what to think when he met them. Their appearance was just different from what he was expecting. He certainly wasn't expecting a severed head.

"The Insulter!" Taysha cried out to him cheerfully as she held up the head in victory.

Anami was speechless.

They told him of the chair, the goods to be salvaged in the ravine, the disappearance of the entire tribe, and reluctantly, Taysha taking the head of the horseman.

The part about the gold necklaces and metals to be scavenged started an excited murmur. Anami recognized the possibility of trouble and hushed them with raised hand.

"We will organize those who are not on duty to go to the field and the ravine tomorrow. Each soldier goes with two of the women. And!" his voice raised over the excited chattering, "AND! And! We will _share_ the spoils!"

Anami then turned to Taysha and her group.

"Choose two of each item for yourself. Put the rest on the ground here. You will guard the goods the others bring back from the ravine."

His eyes once again went to the head that Taysha was still holding, "I'll send some boys to help you separate them into decorative metals, working metals or weapons, armour and whatever you find. Taysha, throw the head away. It's not honourable."

Taysha didn't want to. Next to the bows, it was her biggest trophy. She feigned walking it back to the forest, but instead ran around the route she knew well from the field to her hut. She planted the head in the ground near her bathing pool. She had also kept the ring secret, though she didn't know why. No one would have tried to take it from her. She buried it closer to her bathing pool so she could dig it up and look at it when she had her baths. Then she returned to her post at the Training Grounds to keep guard.

Come morning, a large group had assembled at the field. Some of the women refused to collect from the dead but most were more than happy to. Those that had lost their husbands or children made up most of the latter group. The former remained at the village and tended to the injured and prepared meals for those out searching for trophies and treasures.

Apart from the other things they found, there were a lot of wooden or rock carvings of unknown creatures among the fallen. Protective deities, perhaps. Whatever they were, they had not helped the wearers and thus, were left alone.

That night the spoils of war were divided among the people. Those who had lost the most chose first. Taysha was disappointed to see one of the widows choose one of the most elaborate swords for herself. " _Damn,_ " she thought, along with everyone else who had their eye on it, " _It's not as though she can use it._ "

When everything had been divided and taken, details were set out to collect the bodies and burn them on the far side of the field. While this was being done Anami and his men sat cramped in his hut with Dinesh and the Council. Before the inevitable discussion of the return of power, they had to decide what to do with the two prisoners.

Taysha, who was lucky enough not to be chosen to burn the bodies, sat out at the central fire with Bahnu and Bajesh, retelling her adventures with the scouting party. Behind her low mumbles of Council and Anami's men continued to bicker and debate. Eventually Anami came out of the hut so quickly it looked as if he was storming out the talks in frustration.

But it wasn't so.

He was followed close behind by Ariya. They both walked straight over to the prisoners. Anami placed a cloth bag he had concealed in his hand over the first man's head and started to wrap the thick cloth strand around his neck.

The Kubu man panicked and kicked his legs in a struggle for his life. His muffled cries turned to gags as Anami pulled the looped cloth in opposite directions.

The two guards stepped back in surprise. The second prisoner was looking up at Anami and started pleading. But his own executioner was now behind him and had started to cover his head. Ariya tried to wrap the cloth quickly to stifle the pleas from the man but his hands kept slipping in his panic. Beside him the first prisoner gasped his final attempt to breathe.

Ariya finally got his grip and pulled on the cords. The sound of tearing fabric kept him from pulling harder and the man was able to take a restricted breath. As the first man now lay silent, the second continued to struggle.

Taysha stood in shock watching the man's desperate fight to stay alive. Was it a wife? A child?

He had something to live for.

Ariya made another loop with the cord and pulled tight once again. In that moment it was over. The struggling stopped and a great silence fell over those who witnessed it. The young, the elderly, the women and the men, warriors and Council members alike; it seemed as though a great sin had been committed.

It had indeed brought a dark feeling on the tribe. Yet there was also a feeling of completion. The war was over. They would now carry on as best they could.

\- - - - -
That winter was uncharacteristically dark that year. The skies had constantly been filled with heavy clouds since late autumn and snow had fallen on the mountains around them while there were still leaves hanging on the trees.

Taysha, being one of the few not wounded, found herself included in hunting parties, guard duty, work details and on patrols with the other men. If she wasn't with Adit or Ariya, more often than not she would be put in charge.

A lot of her duties were to scout into the lower valley to make sure the Kubu hadn't just moved a bit to counterattack later. This meant she was away from the village for days to comb up and down the great river with her assigned groups. She greatly enjoyed the chance to finally be able to explore the lower valley and the excitement of a possible hidden enemy added to her feeling of adventure. But the Kubu were nowhere to be found and were never heard of again. The last time Taysha scouted their old encampment, the crows had picked the horseman's head clean. The skull looked even more ominous with its strands of long hair and half-bearded face framed by the blackish-grey clouds above and the beautiful white snow around it.

The most disappointing part of her winter was when Adit was ordered down to dismantle the chair and leave it in pieces. The decision to do so was made by Anami himself and was carried out without question. Apparently, open talk from Taysha and others who thought Anami should receive the chair and keep control over the village pushed him to have it destroyed. His decision to keep a Council over a Chief disappointed her.

Anami would have made a great chief.

She noticed a change in him since the battle. Less talkative than before, he seemed to be looking either at the ground or the fire a lot whenever he did speak. She concluded it was due to the killing of the prisoner and deaths of the others in the village. For Taysha, who had lost her whole family, her Betrothed, her tribe and friends, she felt there was hardly an excuse for Anami. He was the greatest warrior she had known and to see him mope around like a jilted lover frustrated and angered her. The longer Anami's sorrow and melancholy lasted, the deeper her distaste for him grew.

Over the winter, Taysha had resolved to attack the Hoorg that spring. She, Wayu, and Adit took turns training both men and women now. Bahrat had survived his injuries but his crushed ankle healed in a way that meant he had to use a crutch. Ariya was busy as his successor and doing more as Anami was doing less. At least Taysha noticed she had no trouble getting the women to train now as the Wedic all had a fresh interest in defending themselves and their loved ones.

Taysha had groups of women in Kubu armour shooting at targets they had set up in the field. She would join them with her Kubu bow, getting a feeling for the difference between it and the Wedic bow. There was nothing much to teach the women anyway. Archery was simply practice, practice, practice.

Though there were a few women with extraordinary skills, sweet Bahnu wasn't one of them, so Taysha had her come back with every new group and practice. Though her fingers became raw and painful, Bahnu never complained about having to train again.

Seeing the women in the men's armour gave Taysha a complex about her own simple outfit and she went to Hrat to ask him to teach her to make her own. She ended up spending more of her free time with Hrat, the master armourer and bow maker, than with her own family. Hrat was busy trying to unravel the mystery of the Kubu bow. Taysha had been there since the beginning of the process when she thought he would simply fix the bow she had taken off The Insulter.

Seeing it was not such an easy task, Taysha returned every spare moment to check on Hrat and, more often than not, stay to watch what he and his assistants were working on. The first priority was making the new contraptions and frames that would be needed to reproduce the foreign build. Although she was yet to receive any instruction on armour making, she found herself content to learn how to form woods and metals into tools.

From the three broken bows that he had been entrusted with, Hrat had found two different types of wood and bone bonded together in a type of glue. The wood and bone wasn't hard to duplicate but the hardened glue took a full winter before he and his helpers came up with a suitable substitute.

It was a combination of great trial and error, and the luck of the gods, that they came up with a more flexible mixture.

Though not as powerful as the originals, the new Wedic bows added a good couple rockthrow's distance to their old design.

Taysha never learned what was in the mixture, for by this time she had started her armour-making lessons with Layak -- Hrat's assistant and master armourer. One day Taysha noticed he was re-cutting the Kubu armour to re-size them for the women and she learned a lot from him on how the Kubu had constructed theirs and the different techniques they incorporated. The one unique find was some of the Kubu had thinly pounded bronze sheets that were wired behind or in between layers of leather. This was not so surprising to Taysha who was amazed throughout the battle how many arrows a man could take before he fell. It was a good idea, but it also made the heavy armour limited to an immediate battle. She wouldn't want to wear something like that for days at a time.

Layak showed her the difference between cured deer, sheep, goat, boar, wolf and bear hides. He taught her how to harden the leathers and what happened if it was made too hard. He even explained the purpose of each of the tools they used, from adding designs by carving to pounding. It wasn't long before she had wasted a full deer skin in her first attempt. It took her three more tries before she had a breastpiece she was proud of. At least, that was good enough for the moment.

Directly at the bottom of the breastpiece she attached a warskirt made of soft leather with pieces of the bronze sheets wired in behind. At the top, she connected three pieces that overlapped from the protective collar at her shoulders down to her elbows. Even Hrat was impressed with the improvement on design.

Taysha had proven herself as a fighter and a leader, and she had earned her place among the most esteemed warriors of the Wedic, both past and present.

No one in the village argued about her place in the Wedic tribe any longer.

\- - - - -

As the winter snows melted, one by one the men who had recovered from their injuries joined the rest of the village in the daily toil. Around the village, little else changed.

Taysha had remained with Bajesh and his mother and grandmother. He had healed quickly and without infection. The hardest hit of his family seemed to be Grandmother. The death of her last son affected her deeply and she spent most of her days in her bed complaining about the cold.

Anami had completely handed over the teaching of the children to Adit and Ariya. He had the wall between the huts re-enforced and the brush cut back from around the village. The walls were re-cut just high enough for the average woman to see and shoot over.

The Council had raised a pole at the entrance to the village with the patterned cloths of the families who had lost a family member. One family had three cloths tied to it.

Bajesh was still in mourning over his father, and Taysha, sharing his grief, was content with just holding him through the nights. The two had better talks now that her Wedic was improving. Bajesh told her all the things he had been thinking since the day he first saw her being chased out of the village.

On one of the rainy days, when Bajesh was off on some task, Taysha and Bahnu left Shaymo with Grandmother and took off with the wolves to her old hut. They were pleased to see no bears had moved in and the wood and dried food left was still usable and edible. There were just enough dry and comfortable furs for two. They lit the bath fire and after a long soak in the Amazoi bath they spent the day making love.

That day made Taysha want to move back to her hut but it seemed she had better remain in the village for the time being. At least until the summer. Leaving now would take away the energy she provided for the tribe. She had not heard a laugh in the village for months. They had each lost one of their family members or good friends that they drank, laughed and sang with. There was no escape from the sorrow and mourning that hung over them like the dark clouds above. Taysha longed for summer and the ability to forget.

By the time spring had arrived, little Shaymo was waddling around by herself as she made goo-goo sounds at everything. Eating dirt seemed to be her favourite activity.

The group had wisely left her in Grandmother's care. The responsibility of caring for her great-granddaughter eased her through her period of mourning and she now spent her days chasing Shaymo around the village.

The habit of setting sentries around the village remained.

At one point in the winter, the Council had taken the guards off duty completely, but many of the people commented on their feeling of vulnerability so the Council re-instated the practice. And so it continued as a new part of their culture. They had left three openings in the surrounding fence. One, the main gate facing west, was left open but was constantly guarded by two men who stood behind the short wall with bow in hand and spear and shield resting against the fence.

The two entrances to the back were only guarded at night. The steady traffic of the people coming in and out to bathe, wash their cloth pieces, go to the bathroom or fetch water provided all the eyes and ears needed for security during the day.

Taysha, who had been mostly teaching over the winter had noticeably gained weight and lost stamina. Her main training had been on improving her archery. To prepare herself for her planned attack on the Hoorg, she made two extra sets of boots in the Amazoi style: one to dry by the fire as she wore the second pair for her daily run or lifting of stones. By the end of the spring thaw, she was back to doing thirty pull-ups most days.

The amount was just one higher than Little Dinesh, who could do twenty-nine. She had also been practising her stand-up wrestling with Bahrat. It helped to keep him in shape as well. He now walked with a permanent limp but was in constant good spirits and was happy to be alive. Antar, the big man who accompanied her on her scouting mission to the Kubu camp, and Wayu provided her with a large body to practice on when they could.

Anami spent most of his time working with the Council making sure those men who were now referred to as his "soldiers" were bringing in food and helping the widows and their families.

The union of Anami and the Council brought a greater bonding among the village. It was better than it had been in the past and they seemed to have, more-or-less, a standing army.
Taysha would sometimes find Anami at the end of the day smoking hemp or drinking with his father or others as they talked solemnly. She detested seeing him sitting with Councilman Dinesh, though she didn't know exactly why. The image of Anami sitting in the chair as a chief was still so strong for her that it seemed like such a waste of his life to live this way.

One afternoon, she came back from hunting with her group when she saw him once again huddled by the fire. She stopped to watch him as he sat fixated on the moving flames. He looked old. Older than he should look. She hated the way she felt towards him now.

Maybe it was jealousy. His attention was constantly being called upon by the Council and others. It seemed she couldn't remember the last time he had smiled at her or talked to her beyond giving orders. Maybe she had been in love with him. In a way, she knew it was true. But it was no more or less than the love she had for her own father or Bajesh's father.

One night as she lay awake thinking of these things, a thought came to her that maybe it wasn't Anami that made her feel this bad. Maybe it was her. Maybe something had changed in her. Then the strangest of images passed through her head. Maybe it was the chair that she had sat in. Were the women that stood behind Uros that day those who communed with the gods? Had they cursed the chair? Maybe it wasn't a gift after all. Maybe it had been a trap. Was she cursed?

In the blackness of the night, her mind started swimming around inside her head. She knew nothing of curses or the dark arts, especially those of an unknown tribe. In a panic she had to step outside and breathe deeply. In an effort to distract her thoughts she went over and talked with the guard at the nearest gate.

Taysha was tempted to wake Bahnu up, just for comfort, but fought against the urge to disturb her and her mother.

Eventually her eyes became heavy and she crawled back into Bajesh's family hut and went to sleep.

The next morning she went to Bahnu who was helping her mother with breakfast.

"Come with me," Taysha said quietly as she waved a greeting to Bahnu's mother.
"What? What's wrong?"

"I need to ask you something," came the hurried response as she grabbed Bahnu by the arm and pulled her towards the main gate, "Not here. Too many people. Let's go out in field."

At the field Taysha turned to Bahnu, "I don't know these words in language of Wedic," she started, wondering if she should have talked to Bajesh first to get the words right.

"In my village, there is women. Two women. They talk to gods. Both good gods and bad gods. To bring good fortune to us, bad fortune onto our enemies."

"Yes. Priestesses, I'd guess." replied Bahnu, "or sorceresses ... like our Spiritual Leader, yes? There are many words. I think priestess would be best."

"Ah, Bahnu ... too many words. One word please."

"Well, it depends. Sometimes it's for good and sometimes for bad, like you say. Some do only good or only bad. Uh..."

"Okay. Word for bad one."

"They can be both," Bahnu started, then hesitated. "A witch, I guess. Well, it's kind of a bad word..."

Taysha interrupted, "Witch then. Fine. Good enough. That is woman who ask gods for bad reasons, right?"

"Yes. But, not all the time. They can if needed," Bahnu continued and waited as Taysha stood staring at the ground, "Why? Did you meet a witch or something?"

"Uh? No. I don't think so. I think maybe I have ... I don't know the word again ... I have this 'bad wish' on me."

"Ooooh, you mean a _curse_. You think you have a curse on you? That's not good."

"Yes, yes. I know it's not good. I need stop it. Before it become too strong for me. Maybe."

"What kind of curse is it?" Bahnu looked at her as though she was envisioning Taysha turning into a demon or losing her sight or something like that.

"I don't know. But, I know where it comes from."

"Where's that?"

"The chair. Kubu chief's chair in field below."

"Yeah? The one you were wanting to bring to the village. The one Adit took apart?"

Taysha's mouth hung open.
The realization she had almost brought the cursed thing to the village made her see clearly her foolishness and Anami's strength. It could have ripped the village apart in their jostling for power. She, of all people, had been used by the gods.

"Damn you to darkness," she whispered to the unknown god who toyed with her, "Clever. Clever. In losing, the Kubu could still have won."

"What?" asked Bahnu, not understanding that much Osfer.

"Uh, I sat in chair. I remember feeling ... like, power. No, powerful. Very strong. Very pride. It was good feeling. Like that cunt chief who laughed. I see now he is with curse."

"Don't say _cunt_ ," Bahnu whispered as she meekly looked around to see if anyone had heard. Bahnu had told her before but it just slipped out.

"And it's he's ' _cursed_ ' not ' _with curse_.''" Bahnu added to Taysha's grammar.

"So, what do you think?" Taysha asked, "Is someone in village who can help me? Can Spiritual Leader do this for me? Do Wedic know about these curse and such things?"

"We could ask my mother and grandmother. They recite prayers of protection and reading the future. Things like that."

"Yeah. All right. Let's talk to them. They have lunch now?" she asked and turned with Bahnu to walk back.

"Are they having lunch now?" Bahnu corrected.

"Yes. Are they ... having lunch now?"

"Yes."

In the hut, Taysha was relieved to see Bahnu whisper the situation to her mother and her mother in turn whispered to Bahnu's hard-of-hearing grandmother.

After hearing the message, her grandmother sat back and nodded gravely.

"Aaaah," the grandmother said quietly, "Yes. Yes. Yes. It is quite possible to curse things for others to touch. A necklace. A ring. Cloth. Even a chair."

Taysha's heart skipped when she said ring. ' _Why say ring out of all the things she could say?_ ' But Taysha's inner voice told her that wasn't it. The Insulter wouldn't have cursed his own ring but, on the other hand, it did fit his personality. Still, she felt nothing when she touched the ring.

At least, not like how she remembered herself feeling when surveying the field as she sat in the chair. Then she felt unbeatable, arrogant and proud. In any case, she would deal with the chair first and if she felt the curse continue, she would take care of the ring.

"I would say, " the elderly woman continued, "that if you destroy and burn the chair, the curse will flee. It draws its power from the unspeakable words that were spoken into its shape."

Taysha explained the chair had been dismantled.

"Ah, I see," the old woman replied and sat a moment in thought, "Perhaps the curse was not spoken to the chair but to the wood that made it. That way it would remain after the chair is taken apart. It is deep within the items that make it."

A nod came from Bahnu's mother in agreement.

"I must burn it?" Taysha confirmed.

"If that is the source of your curse, yes. You will know for sure the day after it is done. But, I fear the spirits who keep this curse will not give up easily. You must go alone. Bring no other for the spirits to hold on to."

"What about people who broke down the chair and those who sat in it?" interrupted Taysha.

The old woman looked into the fire as she thought.

"We will worry about them later. When you burn the wood that made the chair, you will also lift the curse from them. Come, I will put a protective spell that will keep you safe."

"Protective spell," Taysha repeated quietly, practising her newly learned words.

"Take off your tunic." the old woman said with a motion to indicate she was to drop it off her shoulders. She began to mumble in a language not known to Taysha. Bahnu's mother joined and Bahnu offered a supportive smile.

Taysha felt oddly self-conscious about baring herself to the mother and grandmother of her lover. Perhaps after all this time she had become more like the Wedic than she knew.

The grandmother took a covered bowl of fine, almost white ash and placed it gently before her as she chanted. Her chanting continued as she took a gourd and poured water into the ash and mixed it.

She dipped her fingers in and smeared the paste evenly on her palms.

Without stopping her incantation she motioned for Taysha to close her eyes. When she did, the woman smeared her hands from her eyelids to the end of her temples.

With eyes still closed, she could feel the elder grip both her arms, then grab both her bare thighs, she then leaned forward and placed one hand on Taysha's back and one over her heart and pressed together firmly.

"Open your eyes," said the woman and asked her daughter for something which Taysha didn't understand. Bahnu's mother handed over a small bowl. The elder woman reached in two fingers and pulled a pinch of something and threw it into the fire. The fire instantly snapped and crackled and little sparks shot out about a hand's length from the fire, enough to make Taysha jump.

The old woman picked up a thick burning stick from where she threw the powder.

"Do you have a fire starter on you?" she asked before handing Taysha the burning stick.

"Not on me. No. In my hut," she replied.

"Give her ours." the grandmother said before mumbling unknown words sternly at the stick. She then held it out for Taysha.

"Now, take this and mix it with the fire you make to burn the chair. Stay until nothing is left. Do you have prayers on your tongue?"

"Yes."

"Sing the praises to the gods. Recite poems. Say prayers. The demons speak all the languages of the world. They will understand and will flee as they are bound by the laws of the Underworld."

Taysha pulled her tunic back up to her shoulders. She didn't understand the actual meaning behind what had been said but she did know that after all that whispering she was expected to just run out of their hut at full speed with paint all over herself and holding a burning stick.

" _Yeah. No one's going to notice that."_

She reached out and took the now sacred fire.

" _And that field's a full day's trip too. Damn it. I'm going to freeze my ass and heart."_

It seemed Bahnu could read her mind and she handed Taysha her fur mantle. Taysha put it on, smiled nervously at everyone, and not knowing what to say, popped out of the door and started running. A couple standing nearby were the only ones to notice her. She didn't even bother to look at the guards as she ran through the main gate. By the time she had gotten mid-field she was feeling good. It had been along time since she had just run. The clear night above gave her enough moonlight to see if she kept the burning wood at her back. She continued moving at full speed as she crashed through the darker forest.

Her pace hardly even slowed at the ravine path.

She felt like a deer. Sleek, fast and agile.

But she also realised she had been foolish not to bring any type of weapon beyond the knife in her boot. Though the thought prompted her to keep moving, the other half of her mind reminded her of the dangers of sweating in the cold weather. To add to the frustration, by the time she had reached the bottom of the ravine, the stick had already lost all its flame. The glow still gave off heat and she was left to hoping that would still be enough to destroy the curse.

No cumbersome weapons, no heavy armour or supplies. Taysha was surprised to realize how much those things slowed a person down. Not having to look around for prey or predator helped considerably as well. With every step, she told herself the fatigue would soon hit her. But it did not. Though sweaty and panting heavily, she continued to run until she arrived at her goal.

At the edge of the rocky field, Taysha slowed her pace to almost a stalk. It wasn't so much because she was tired even then, it was just that she had seen plenty of fields and rockslides in her travels but never both in one place. It looked as though it held a special meaning for the gods. She remembered the instruction of Bahnu's grandmother and she started singing, through deep breaths, the songs of protection of her people. Ironically, they were mostly songs to the gods, but she was in no mindset to fool around with changing words now. She kept singing prayers until she reached the neat pile of sticks.

The distance to the forest in front of her seemed much closer than she remembered and she could see far into the trail which led to the abandoned camp and that head on the spike.

She pictured the head suddenly racing up the path at her and she quickly returned her attention to making the fire as multiple chills coursed through her body.

Sticking the burnt end of the stick in the neatly piled grass, she started taking the smaller pieces from the pile of wood. She was pleased to see they had been thrown together just randomly enough to let the wood dry almost to the bottom. The few wet pieces would dry out as they burned, once she got things going.

The stick she had brought was barely smoking. It wasn't enough to start the fire, so Taysha used the flint pieces Bahnu's mother had lent her. The grass took in a shower of sparks from the first strike of the rock. Taysha picked up the remnants of the chair and broke them, piling them carefully on the burning grass. She set the damper ones up over the fire to dry and replaced the stick from Bahnu's grandmother on the top.

She kept the fire going with grass and other sticks that lay about and the pieces of the three original chairs. She didn't know which pieces belonged to which chair and she wasn't about to take the chance of leaving the wrong ones behind. So, she piled the fire as high as she could with every bit of wood she could find.

Taysha now looked to the sky for the signs of dawn but there were none. She had made it down from the Wedic village before the turn of night. Her still heavy beating heart and sweaty clothes were testament to that.

The fire gave her mixed feelings inside her circle of light. On one hand it provided the safety and comfort of fire, on the other it created eerie shadows on the forest wall in front of her. The fire also killed her ability to see at night and it most definitely announced her presence to the entire valley. Yet for Taysha, the worst thing was having to sit close to this wood that was suppose to be releasing the mischief and anger of the gods as it burned. She looked back towards the eastern mountains and the dark sky behind them. It was going to be a long night and she hadn't any food or drink, or sleeping cloths.

With the wood piled carefully on the large fire she sat facing it with her back against a rock. Her mind played tricks on her as she measured the time she left the village to when she arrived at the field. Though she ran all the way, it was hard to imagine she had made it to the field in less than one night.

The mischievous whispers of the gods played with her mind telling her she had slept in the ravine and simply not remembered it. She struggled through the confusion until she found herself being woken by a light rain on her face. The various thoughts had been a series of dreams that she cared not to try and recall. The fire was still going strong, so she hadn't been asleep long, but she was happy to see the forest didn't seem so imposing in the dim light of early morning.

She stoked the fire with more dead grass before it got too wet and rearranged the wood to burn better. She had noticed the burnt remains of the stick which carried the sacred fire from Bahnu's grandmother. Though charred, it remained in the same shape she had received it in, while the wood around it had burnt to ash. A shiver ran down Taysha's back and she stopped looking at it. Taysha hated this kind of thing.

Venturing between the worlds was not for her.

She stood guard over the fire as the sky slowly changed from grey to a dull blue and colour seeped into the valley where she stood. There was still snow on the mountains across the large river that she could hear flowing just out of sight on the western side of the field. Although she was very tired, she felt peace. Her thoughts towards Anami felt different and she pitied the position he now found himself in. She stoked up the fire as high as she could with more grass. She didn't want to put in new wood and confuse it for the wood from the chair. If she did, she could be there all day and she would much rather get back to a warm bed and hot food.

When the sun had risen high enough for the heat to reach her directly, she laid her head back down on her rock pillow and closed her eyes. To her surprise, she awoke that evening. The fire had burned completely down and was no more than a small pile of smouldering ashes.

She sat up with a start. For the longest moment, she didn't know what had happened. She thought she was back to the beginning of the first night. When she looked around for the dismantled chairs, she saw none. It finally occurred to her she had slept through the day. Perhaps the warmth of the sun had kept her comfortable or kept her thinking the fire was still burning. She could remember tending the fire during the day with Bajesh and Bahnu but it had obviously been another dream.

She looked over to the west as the sun just dipped behind the mountain, painting the clouds above her head

She dragged her boot through the lifeless coals as her heart still beat hard from the confusion she experienced at waking. Not even the stick from the old woman remained. She was free. And she saw no reason to stay any longer.

It was an uncomfortable and painful run back.

Taysha had chosen to ignore the pleas of her tightened muscles and had pushed herself onward steadily as she had the day before. It was an unnecessary and perhaps foolish thing to do. In her rush to get home, she failed to rest or drink properly. By the time she had started up the dark ravine, her mind was already suffering from her body's maltreatment.

Although all the dead Kubu and their horses had been pulled up and burned months ago, voices and cries in the wind haunted her to the point she began to think she had been taken to a world of endless night by the spirits. Her heart beat heavily in her chest from the strain on both body and mind.

"I shouldn't have slept. Shouldn't have slept," Taysha scolded herself. She kept moving forward and constantly noticed places along the ravine that she didn't recognise, and it sent her into deeper panic. She felt a constant chill on her back as if being lightly touched by the Dead. The only things keeping her sanity were the points on the path she did recognize. A tree or a rock, a turn in the trail that told her she was not only still in the world of the Living but progressing through it.

Still, Taysha had convinced herself the trail wasn't this long before. She was sure the gods had lengthened it and would keep lengthening it forever. Perhaps, she had already made it to the village and the tribe stood around her as she sat mumbling to herself like a crazy woman.

"Bajesh! Help me!" she cried out in Wedic, just in case that's what had truly happened. She stopped to listen. If the spirits had taken her mind, maybe Bajesh's voice would lead her out of this night-world.

There was no reply and she started to run.

"Bajesh! Bahnu!" she cried again, but other than the haunting laughter in the wind, there were no replies.

Another part of the trail she recognized and the lighter night sky in the distance came into view. She could tell she wasn't far from the top now. The worst thing now would be to stop. Her legs ached and her lungs burned. Tears streamed down her face and she screamed into the never-ending path, "BAJESH!"

With her last cry, she had come into the narrowing at the top of the ravine. The instant feeling of relief she should have felt was lost to the new fear that she wouldn't make it to the village. The fear that something that had been following behind her, touching at her neck ever so lightly, would soon grab her tightly and drag her to her death. She scrambled on all fours to climb the last stretch and to her great relief saw, in the far distance, a yellow light. It was from the fires at the entrance to the Wedic village.

Yet once again the Fear gripped her heart as the voices in her head told her she would never make it to the fires alive. She could bear it no longer and she spun around to face her pursuing under-gods.

Better to fight them face-to-face.

"AAAAaaaah!" she screamed into the dark, ready to grab and fight them to the death.

But there was nothing but the rustling of the leaves as they fled from her.

Taysha took a few steps backwards and turned to run again. Her lungs bursting, she had run the entire ravine path uphill.

She collapsed when she finally reached the bottom of village entrance. The guards quickly came down to help her. One of them was Indar, her archer companion from the battle.

"Are you all right?" he asked as she sat panting by his feet.

"Yes," she smiled wearily up at him, "All better now. They're gone. Curse are gone."

Somehow what she said didn't surprise Indar at all and he smiled back, "Good. You are too young to carry such burdens."

His answer was not acknowledged as Taysha focused on catching her breath. But she was glad, although just too damn tired to show it.

\- - - - -
It became evident to Taysha that she was now fully part of the Wedic tribe when talk among the village of a formal ceremony of marriage for her and Bajesh began circulating. She first heard it from Layak and Hrat, and then later from Bahnu's mother. When Bajesh himself finally brought it up one evening, Taysha refused. She told Bajesh that unless there was a marriage of the three of them, she wasn't interested. A ceremony binding people to each other seemed silly, anyway. What if they fought all the time? What sense is there for an owl and a snake to live together by oath? Even more ridiculous was telling an owl she was to act as a snake, and vice-versa.

It was clear to her that she shared most of the traditional manly duties with Bajesh anyway. Not only _shared_ , but she was the better in many ways. It was she who had saved him from the wolf and Bahnu from a bear. She was the better hunter and fighter and even a leader of men. She could make her own armour, her own weapons and as far as being able to just walk off into the mountains and not die; that had been tried and proven years ago.

For Taysha, the suggestion the two engage in a ceremony of marriage was the equivalent of the Wedic asking her to suddenly be like the other women of the village. More exactly, she was being asked to be like the _majority_ of the women like Anami's wife who seemed to count the accomplishments of her husband as her own. Taysha felt such women were no better than sheep.

Bajesh had listened patiently as Taysha found the right words to express herself. The longer he sat quietly listening, the calmer and more exact her words became. In the end, he gave her a big smile and placed his fingers gently on her knee.

"You will always have my heart," he said to her relief.

Bajesh had thought through the marriage problem between them from the day he had first seen her. He knew that, if she stayed, there would be problems of culture, language, customs and spiritual beliefs that would be against them from the beginning. All he ever wanted was her love.

And he knew he had that.

\- - - - -
Winter passed without incident.

Spring duties consisted of a quick check the Kubu camp, which revealed no signs of human presence.

On the first hot day of summer, The Three moved back to Taysha's hut with Shaymo and the wolves. Its space seemed so big for their little family. It was nice for the wolves to be separated from the walled village permanently and they spent the greater part of the first day running around in their forest. The grass had overgrown the path from the village and filled the training ground. Bajesh spent the first day cutting the grass down in the main areas with her curved blade.

Taysha and Bahnu hoisted the furs that stayed there the winter. A noticeable stain from their secret love making sessions had them making tell-tale eyes at each other. They chased out bugs and placed spiders carefully outside so they would make webs and help control the flying insects.

It was strange to find the first few nights seem too quiet and lonely. Taysha's thoughts turned to the memories of Father and when Anami had come out to train her everyday. She found being separated from the busy village conversely made her want to be alone. In fact, she spent most of the first few days pretending to go off training only to sit somewhere in the sunshine with her wolves and stare at whatever lay between her and her thoughts.

Today it was the dancing shadows of the leaves that played over her in the clear, sunny sky. She lay stretched out on a grassy patch and thought a lot of Anami. She hadn't talked to him for quite a while. They should talk about the battle, she thought. It was glorious and incredible. How she and Adit held the two main War Groups together in the centre of the battle and how Anami had cleared the right flank of the archers. She remembered seeing Anami in the distance run into the forest and almost single-handedly put the enemy to flight.

Of all the people that had been chosen to die that day, she deeply wished Father had not been one of them. At first she hated herself for feeling more sorrow at his loss than the loss of her own father but she knew that wasn't really the truth. The depth of sorrow was the same, only she hadn't seen her father die. She also hadn't had the luxury of time to mourn the death of her own family.

She had spent that time running and trying to stay alive.

She thought the depth of sorrow felt for the death of Bajesh's father carried the weight of the lingering feelings for her own loved ones. For it seemed her mind kept bringing her to those she had been trying not to think of the last few winters.

She raised her hand and made a fist in the air, letting it bathe in the sunlight. She rotated it to view the strength of her arm from all angles. Her bicep was just as big, if not bigger, than any of the young men her age. Her thoughts then led her through the battle with the Kubu once more.

"I can't believe it ... not a scratch. Maybe I have been chosen by the gods. By the Goddess. But for what? Was that it? To save the Wedic? I guess. Now that's done, do I just live and grow old? Bear children and die..."

She rolled over on her side and petted Wada.

"What if I don't want to?" she asked her wolf, as she followed her imagination around her created visions of the Hoorg village. She recalled how that spring, Ariya had strictly forbidden Taysha from going after the Hoorg.

"You don't talk about it. You don't think about it. You don't train for it," Ariya had said sternly to her amongst the group of the others who knew of her plans, "Six months ago it wouldn't be a problem. Now we can't risk having our solid warriors taking off for a month to start another war."

For some unexplainable reason, Taysha simply agreed.

It was obviously not what Ariya and the others had been expecting. Taysha remembered Adit's look of disappointment most. She thought it ironic, considering that was how she felt about Anami until recently. But, she knew what it would mean to have the village devoid of even three of its better fighters. Let alone if the Hoorg were able to track her back and seek their revenge once again.

Truth be told, the images of Amazoi faces had begun fading in her mind. Besides, she knew her family had all been killed. And she had little respect or pity left for any woman who had let herself be taken so easily.

\- - - - -
For the next four winters, Taysha and her adopted tribe lived peacefully in their enclosed plateau above the valley floor. Feasting, love making, celebrating the births of children and new adults... marriages.

Brother and his long time lover were formally married at the news she had conceived. They had a healthy boy that following spring.

There was also the mourning of loved ones who had past on and the listening to their Tale of Life.

As Taysha grew to understand the custom of the Tale of Life, she was disappointed to learn it was usually for the direct family's ears only. She promised herself she would tell as many people who would listen all the littlest details she could remember before her death. She deeply wished her people had some similar custom. She knew nothing of her parent's parents. She knew nothing of her people. Where they came from or what connection they shared with the surrounding tribes. She was sad to think what little she knew would die with her.

Taysha had worked to teach little Shaymo her language and culture through stories, songs and drawing symbols of the Amazoi. At four, Shaymo already spoke Osfer better than her father.

Taysha taught her to call both her and Bahnu 'mother'. Somewhere along the line, Shaymo naturally learned to call them mother in their respective languages. And her bond with each of the women grew equally strong.

In Taysha's 19th winter, she found herself pregnant again. Although she had been diligent to prevent this from happening, an uninhibited romantic evening with Bajesh had produced enough chance for Fortune to slip in. She greeted the events with more poise this time, although the familiar sickness made her regret having surrendered to a moment of weakness.

That autumn, her second daughter was born.

Taysha named her Pierla, which meant Sweet Wind in the Osfer language.

Taysha decided not to give her a Wedic name.

She had become very aware of the value of her dying culture and language. Her daughters would always be Amazoi first, Wedic second. It seemed not to be a problem with the others, which Taysha was grateful for.

Unlike Shaymo, Pierla had more of a Wedic look to her. The obvious difference in the sisters' appearance constantly had Taysha worrying someone would suspect the fathers of each of them were different. But as the months passed without any sign of trouble, Taysha had let the thought float away and she returned to her usual life. Pierla had become Bahnu's new responsibility who shared it happily with Bajesh, Mother and Pierla's four year old sister, Shaymo.

Taysha spent most of her time with her training and the constant challenge of reproducing the power of the original Kubu bows. Something that evaded every attempted new bow.

Anami made a public announcement that Adit was taking over for him; that he was now the Master-of-Arms for the Wedic. Ariya was announced as Anami's advisor and things settled into place. It was only then that Taysha finally understood the difference in positions between Ariya and Adit. She had always wondered how Adit, who was younger than both Ariya and Bahrat, could be expecting to become the next Master-of-Arms.

It seemed everyone's positions of power in the village were to their liking. Even for Bahrat, who took his position on Anami's council.

Bahnu's poor mother had offers from three of the village men to marry Bahnu over the years, but Bahnu refused them all. It was a great shock particularly to Tapal, who seemed to be deeply in love with her.

It was these daily pricks and prods of human interaction that distracted Taysha's mind from dwelling on the Hoorg or the Great Water. And it would have carried her to the end of her life if it hadn't been for the day that the Goddess finally spoke.

\- - - - -
It was a beautifully warm spring day past Pierla's first winter, and Shaymo's fifth.

Taysha rested lazily in the light shade of the budding leaves on the edge of her Training Grounds. She sat with her bum on her bear skin and her legs out on the cool, fresh grass. She had just been spending the Wedic holiday with Bahnu and the children while Bajesh visited his brother's son. It was warm enough for her to just wear her summer tunic that came down to her thighs and her Amazoi boots with the rabbit fur wrapped around the top. Bahnu was also dressed in the wrap of Wedic summer fashion as she sat cooking at the outdoor fire. Between them the pipe of Smoke was handed back and forth.

Taysha dreamily looked across her little field to see Antar and Natu walking towards her. They were sweaty and dirty and carried their bows and small packs. Obviously back from hunting, she thought. Since their scouting and looting of the Kubu five winters ago, the three of them had become good friends. She waved to them with her pipe and a big smile in greeting as they approached.

"I haven't seen you two for awhile." Taysha smiled through the haze of her cannabis induced state.

"Yeah. Not for at least three whole days." Natu's familiar sarcastic reply sent her into fits of giggles.

"Taysha," Antar said casually, "We found something... or I should say _someone_ that you might want to know about."

Taysha sat looking blankly at the large man a moment. She squinted her eyes, and before Antar could speak again, she raised her hand at him.

"Oh... Ooooh ... I am so very much gone right now..." she said with a long exhale and broke into another fit of giggling that was fuelled by Bahnu following suit.

"I'm afraid she's been smoking that all day." Bahnu said through her hands as she tried to stop herself from laughing. She suddenly calmed and turned back to stirring the cooking pot as if nothing had happened. Looking at how Bahnu was acting, it was apparent that Taysha wasn't the only one that had a bit of the Smoke in her head.

The men looked at each other, and decided to sit down. They were experienced enough to know this might take awhile.

"You know..." Taysha said as the men started to unfurl the sheep skins they still had tied to the small of their backs, "I always wondered about the Master-of-Arms ... Why is Adit above Ariya and Bahrat? They are older, no? They should be first for Master-of-Arms, shouldn't it?"

"Shouldn't _they_." Bahnu corrected.

Antar shrugged as he placed his skin down to sit.

"That's the way of our people."

"No..." Taysha stopped him firmly, "No. No. No. No-no. This is always the same, ' _the way of our people_ ' blah, blah, blah. It's an excuse. I want to know why."

Natu sat down beside Antar as he replied, "It's because the Master-of-Arms needs council. Bahrat and Ariya were chosen by Anami to be his council ... You know the two old men that are always with Anami's father? They aren't just friends ... they're his council. The Master-of-Arms council stays with him until he dies."

"The Master-of-Arms, is always Master-of-Arms, but he hands the teaching to the new Master-of-Arms." Antar added.

"Asking us why it is so ... is the same as us asking you why your people would choose someone for such an important position by their age, rather than their abilities."

Taysha's mouth hung open as she absorbed the information.

"Ahh ... " she said quietly and Natu continued, "Some would say it's a bigger honour to be named council ... It depends on who you are and what you feel is important."

He finished with a non-committing shrug.

Taysha nodded and nodded.

She nodded a little too much, in fact, but considering her state of mind, it was understandable enough.

"I see ... I finally ... Okay..." her eyes wandered and Antar opened his mouth to tell her the news they can come to tell, when Taysha suddenly looked back at them and asked,

"So, who is Adit's council?"

The two men looked at each other, obviously not knowing.

"I don't know, Tash," Natu replied, "I don't think he's decided yet. You'll have to ask him..."

"Maybe I can be council?" Taysha said wide eyed then burst into another fit of giggles.

The two men sat there and waited until she had stopped. When she did, she looked at them confused, then held her hand nervously up to her mouth and started looking around.

"Wooowww ... That was strange... " she said to everyone without further explanation.

"Taysha." Antar tried again to regroup her concentration. The moment she looked at him he knew she wouldn't follow along if he took too long.

So, he just blurted it out,

"Taysha, we found some people from your tribe."

The weight of what was said seemed to settle on the group of four like a heavy, heavy snowfall. In the discomfort of Taysha's stare, Natu added, "Maybe. We don't know for sure."

"Wha?" she tried to focus on the words. He repeated himself and she scrambled to her feet excitedly.

"Oh? Where? Here? Let me see them."

"Uh. No, not here." Natu answered, while motioning her to return to her seat.

"Sit down." Antar urged, seeing her start to sway. People that felt they had to move about when they took the Smoke always made him nervous.

"Where? Where are these people?" she asked again, half way between a crouch and sitting, and a little more than wobbly.

"Sit down and I'll tell you." Antar insisted again strongly, "You don't need to stand up. They're not here anyway."

Taysha, locked in her half-crouch, tried to work through the information. Unsure, she looked back behind the men towards the village as if to see these people they spoke of standing there.

"Oh ... Wow... " she said finally, "I must be dreaming this. Deep breaths. Deep breaths."

She straightened herself and inhaled deeply.

"Taysha, please sit dow..." Natu started to say before being interrupted by Taysha's upraised hand that motioned him to be silent. She took another breath before looking at them with clearer eyes.

"Sorry. Sorry..." she said as she sat, "Can you ... tell me one more time?"

As soon as she sat down, she felt the distinct difference of textures between the fur and the grass on the back of her legs. It rushed up towards her brain.

"We think we found ... uh... " Antar once again started but was interrupted by Taysha returning to her feet.

"Gotta stand," she announced, "Gotta stand. Don't mind me. Tell me again. Sorry. I'm okay."

She followed with a series of exhales with short puffy sounds. The men looked blankly up at her as she tried to clear herself of the effects.

"Of all the times..." Antar mumbled, and then he noticed Natu's look of getting close to the limit of his patience.

"She's on the Smoke," Antar said to him with a sigh, "We should just tell Bajesh to tell her later."

This seemed to grab Taysha's focus.

"No, please. Tell me. Please."

Natu leaned forward a bit and started talking.

"We were far up the valley. Up to the end where it curves around from north to the east." he pointed out past the mountains behind him, "We were on our fourth day ... It was a straight walk up the river. No game. Anywhere."

"Well," interrupted Antar, "There wasn't anything on our side of the river anyway."

"True." Natu agreed, "Across the river? Of course. Deer, boar, birds ... You name it. So, anyway, we were way up there. When we come across a hunting party of four on the other side of the river."

"Skinning a deer." Antar added with a tone of irony.

"Right. Skinning a cursed deer. Right in front of us."

"We could have hit them with a rock, they were so close." Antar followed.

At this point in their story two more guests from the village came walking up towards Taysha's hut. One of the men was Adit, and the other was Little Dinesh. Although he was now older than Taysha had been when she first arrived in the Wedic village. And one could hardly call him 'little' any more.

"Did you tell her yet?" Adit yelled out.

"What does it look like?" Antar called back.

"Did you tell her about the mark on the shield?"

"Give a man a chance, Boy. Sit down. Sit down and let me tell my story." Antar scoffed.

"Sorry I'm late, Tash." said Adit as he passed her and sat down on the training ground bench, "We had blood all over ourselves. Had to change first."

Taysha had been doing fine controlling herself up to that point, when all of a sudden Bahnu let out an unexpected snort and they both started laughing again.

"What's the joke?" Dinesh asked.

"Smoke, obviously." Adit leaned over and took Taysha's pipe from the ground. She stopped laughing enough to tap the wooden bowl full of fresh cannabis with the toe of her boot for him to help himself to. Bahnu suddenly became conscious of her own laughter and stopped with a shocking stare into the meal she had been preparing.

"Oh ... gods... " she said to the stew, "I've been making this all day..." She tried to clear her head by widening and narrowing her eyes.

"Can we finish now?" Natu asked

"Yes, yes, by all means," chimed Adit as he lit the pipe.

"Where was I?"

"They were skinning a deer..." Antar filled in.

"Oh, right... did I say who the members of this hunting party were?" he addressed the question to Taysha, who was focusing hard to stay in the same realm as the storyteller.

"Uh ... who?" she asked.

"The members of the other hunting party. It was made up of one man and three women. Isn't that odd?" he sat back satisfied as if he had just delivered all the information needed.

"Uh... ?" Taysha shook her head wondering what the point was.

"Taysha." Adit added, handing the pipe over to Dinesh, "Doesn't it sound weird there were three women in a hunting party? I mean, it was definitely a hunting party. They were all in browns and had bows ... I mean, that in itself is enough to tell me they're from your tribe. You're the only female hunter I know."

"But..." Taysha replied slowly, "But ... the women of my tribe never hunt. Before I didn't hunt. No woman did hunt in our tribe."

"Tell her about the shield." Dinesh mentioned, obviously confident they had found her people.

"Right. The shield. The shield." Adit said, and motioned to Natu to finish the story.

"Uh, yes. Well, when they saw us, they spooked like rabbits. The man had a shield on his back and swung it around ... facing us ... while the women ran into the trees behind him. It had a ... a mark, like the one there."

He pointed to a mark with a circle with a line drawn straight through it from top to bottom with two smaller circles that lay on each side of the centered line. Taysha started moving towards it and was captured half-way by little Shaymo wrapping her arms around her legs and sitting on her foot. Taysha hobbled the rest of the way to the banner moving slightly in the evening breeze.

"This one?" she asked as she held it taught for them.

"Yeah. That's it. That's the one. No mistake," raised a chorus of affirmatives from the men.

Taysha let the banner slide from her hand and she looked down at Shaymo looking up from her legs with a big smile. Taysha put her hand on her daughter's head.

"That," she said, "That my people's symbol for earth. Life. Male and Female ... Life ... It has many meanings," she looked back up at the men, "I don't know ... maybe our elder or ancestor got it from other tribe. Like the Kubo, or whatever is their name. I shared all bad words and words of the gods..."

She let her gaze float down to her daughter then back to the men. The look in her eyes seemed to say it wasn't worth the pain of being wrong.

Dinesh cleared his throat, "I don't mean to sound arrogant, but I think we're all missing the most important point... The fact they all looked like her. Black hair, white-ish skin."

"Aahh! Right!" exclaimed Natu as he raised his hands in surrender to Dinesh's superior point.

"Especially the women." added Natu.

"Especially the women." confirmed Antar.

Before Taysha could say anything, Adit started speaking. "And they had the same low-cut boots ... with the rabbit fur at the top."

"Did they?" Natu asked, as he accepted the pipe.

Even from an early age, Taysha knew the Amazoi boots had been a unique trading item, and she stood mutely staring back at the men as she sorted the information in her head. As the silent pause grew longer, Adit spoke again,

"Look, Taysha. They may not be your tribe, but there's a good chance they could be a sister tribe. You know ... like, sometime before you were born ... Your tribe could have separated like we did from ours."

It made sense.

But in Taysha's present state of mind, all of it was too, too far away to think about. It didn't matter more than the hold her daughter now had on her leg. Taysha limped back to the fire with Shaymo still clinging.

"Well. Do you want know what I think?" she said as she approached them, "I think you must help me celebrate. Bring me some of deer, or whatever you kill and some wine!"

"Hurray!" Adit let out a cheer.

"Sounds good to me." Antar said matter-of-factly as he took the pipe from Natu.

"Not me. The Missus will kill me." Natu backed out.

"Sheep shit!" Adit threw his chin up at his fellow warrior, "She'll only kill you if you stay out too late. Look, the sun isn't even down yet."

"Bring her along." Bahnu invited, "We'd love to drink with her."

"Ah. I don't think so... I..."

"What about you, little brother?" Adit asked Dinesh.

"Sure. Maybe until sundown. I'm not bringing my wife either though." The joke was about the wife he didn't have, and Adit let out a mocking laugh.

"I will be your wife, Little Dinesh," Taysha ribbed.

Dinesh looked like he was going to say something back, but his face flushed and his tongue sat heavy.

"You wouldn't know what to do with her, boy!" Adit retorted with a slap on his back.

"I can teach him." Taysha replied to the further embarrassment of Dinesh.

"Maybe you should go, Natu." Adit added with eyebrows raised high, "Too many cocks here already."

"Never too many!" Taysha yelled out, sending Bahnu into another fit of giggles.

"Oh ... gods. Let's just go get the food and stuff." Natu replied as he pushed himself up to his feet.

"Boys!" chimed Bahnu with the cutest smile, "Can you bring some more greens and mushrooms for the stew?"

"And some eggs?" Taysha threw in hopefully.

"And invite Ashritha and her husband."

"And Tapal..." finished Taysha with a shared look and a shrug at Bahnu who would rather not of had the extra pressure of him being there.

"Anything for you two! Anything at all." cooed Adit and gave a smile and a wink to Taysha.

Their daytime celebration soon included Bajesh, Brother and his wife, cousin Ashritha, the usual group of revellers, and Kala.

Kala was now young woman, and like her emulated warrior Taysha, she sat muscular and quiet. She had become the first Wedic woman to teach the martial arts.

With their friends, lovers, and spouses there was soon over twenty people drinking, laughing, smoking, eating, singing, making food and making love.

The wolves, not much liking the commotion, took to the forest. Drunken humans were atrociously mannered things.

\- - - - -
It had been two mornings since the impromptu celebration and Taysha had used the time to think things over. On that morning a sudden fear hit her stomach. She realized she had simply wasted the day before, sleeping off the Morning Spirits that were left over from the alcohol. She thought of her never being able to track the unknown group down, and even more terrible, she thought of the possibility and hope they were actually from her tribe.

She quickly went to the village to talk to whichever one of Adit's hunting party she saw first.

She found Natu.

"Can you take me to place you found those people?"

"Uh ... I can't. Not that I don't want to." He stopped and sighed. He looked at Taysha like he had a thousand things to say and was sorting out whether or not to tell her any of them. Finally he spoke again.

"My wife ... she really is jealous of you, to be honest."

Taysha lifted her eyebrows and the sides of her mouth curled in disbelief.

"Sorry to just say it ... so ... so clearly. I'm sorry. I don't want her mad and she's ... well, she's a gentle girl. You know."

Taysha felt the growing tenseness in her shoulders.

"I know." She said with a supportive smile and though she wanted to, she didn't touch him on the shoulder in case his wife was looking, "I'll ask Adit or one of others."

"I'm really sorry, Tash."

"No worries, Natu. I really understand."

It was fine.

Better to know from the beginning than to have someone in their group moaning about why they weren't turning around after five or six days of tracking.

She found Adit in his hut with his grandmother.

When he invited her in his grandmother left them to be alone. She gave Taysha a silent smile of welcome as she did.

"You don't have to leave." Taysha protested, but the elderly lady continued out the door.

Adit laughed quietly as he put his sewing aside. When Taysha looked at him he explained what he thought was so funny.

"She's one of the one's who originally didn't want you in the village, you know." he said with a disrespectful jerk of his head towards the old lady before leaning closer to Taysha, "She really is a goose." he whispered, enjoying the chance to use the insult she had invented for his benefit all those years ago.

More than the nostalgia of past memories, Taysha felt very conscious about being alone in Adit's hut, especially with him sitting on his sleeping-furs with his shirt off.

And she knew he knew it.

"Ah, don't worry about her," he said putting on a pot of water to heat, "she just doesn't want to be here when we're having sex."

"Yeah. That's not..."

She wanted to say something witty, but the Wedic language stuck in her throat.

"Oh. Don't be so hard on yourself." Adit swiped his hand in the air at her as he pulled out dried herbs for the tea.

The meaning of his is comment wasn't clear to her, but she was pretty sure it was meant as a joke of some sort. Apparently that was the end of their familiar banter, and he laid down and propped himself up on his arm,

"Okay ... What were you wanting then?" he asked seriously before adding, "...if you haven't come for sex again."

"Again? What? We never... " she stammered, avoiding looking into his eyes.

"Okay. I get it. I'm sorry. You're not in the proper mind for joking. Seriously, what do you want?"

' _Sex._ ' was the first thing that jumped up in her head, but she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of saying it.

Maybe she did like him more than she would admit.

" _Aagh!"_ she screamed in her head, _"This is NOT why I came here. Curse him."_

She sat a moment to organise her thoughts, but she knew if she didn't speak soon, Adit would be blabbering to fill in the silence.

"I want to go where you find that hunting party. Maybe you think are Amazoi. My people. Maybe my people."

"Finally. When do you want to go?" he replied quickly with a light wobble of his head.

His sudden agreement caused Taysha to fumble. She forgot about Adit's willingness to go on adventures.

"Uh ... how many days away? For walking?"

"How many days to walk?" he corrected, "Let's see...We got there in four nights. But, we did a lot of tracking and stalking. I would say we can get there easily in under three nights. Two nights if we ran all the way ... Uh, that's from the bottom of the ravine, though."

Taysha nodded, mentally figuring out supplies.

"Are you up for it?" Adit added, "I know you haven't been training after ... Uh, what's her name? Your new daughter?"

"Pierla."

"Right. Pierla. Sorry. I always want to say 'Pietra'. I don't know why..." he lowered his gaze and poked at the fire.

"I'm fine." she confirmed, "A long winter, but children keep me in shape."

Adit threw his head back with a dry laugh.

"You're getting better at our language." he complimented, "You've probably forgotten most of yours."

His comments sounded indescribably harsh. Adit always spoke with an undertone of competitiveness and criticism, but the way he said that sentence contained an uncharacteristically sad tone to it.

"No. I teach my daughters everyday. Six winters isn't enough for forget. Only enough to learn."

"Hahah! Well said ... well said." he chortled.

A silence fell between them and Adit picked up the boots he was mending as the silence seemed to grow.

"Sure you're not here for sex?" he looked up at her mockingly.

"Yes. I mean No. Yes, I not here for sex!" she threw a bundled cloth at him, which he easily avoided. All the while he kept that annoying, cocky smile on his face.

"Then, you'd better get ready to leave." he looked up at her with a smile, "We have no idea how far those hunters went."

She caught something in his look and suddenly a realization hit her.

" _This kind of means we're just going ... like, Alone?"_

A brief wave of panic washed over her.

"Maybe we ask someone else to come with us? Like Bajesh."

Taysha hated herself the moment she said Bajesh's name. She didn't know if it was because she mentioned his name out of just wanting to see Adit's reaction, or because she was afraid Adit would simply agree.

"Whatever you like." Adit replied as he turned his attention to the coals of the fire, "I'm pretty sure you and I can handle anything we would meet out there. But, it's up to you."

It was the typical non-committing response from the Head Goose himself. Taysha looked up at the roof.

"Ok, I get ready and meet you at Training Ground tomorrow morning. Dawn?"

"Yeah. Tomorrow's fine. I'll get Ariya to help teach for us until we get back."

"See you tomorrow."

"See you then." Adit replied without much feeling. He sat poking the fire as Taysha made her way out the door. It left Taysha with a feeling of something being incomplete. She stopped and turned back to him.

"What?" she asked aggressively.

"What, what?" he mocked, sounding more like himself.

"You're all rotten-faced. Poking at fire like that. Stop it."

"Hey. I was making ... Look... I've got important things to think about. Stop bothering me." he had once again taken up the mantle of his chosen character.

"Important things?" questioned Taysha, happy to be playing the game between them once again.

"Yeah. Important and secret things. Go away."

"What are these things?"

A smile snuck across Adit's face and he scrambled up like he was going to grab and wrestle her, "Important and secret! I'll tell you tomorrow!"

His grab just missed her as she popped out of the hut with a squeal. Those standing in the vicinity looked, and Taysha was surprised to find that the looks she got didn't bother her as much as she thought they would.

As she walked past, she smiled and nodded at Adit's grandmother who sat just outside.

"Thank you for your hospitality."

" _Oh gods ... I bet she was listening to the whole conversation."_

Her heart started beating a little heavy.

She found herself hoping Bajesh wouldn't come home that night. After all, there was no sense in lying to him. He never showed signs of jealousy. At least he didn't in the conventional manner. He would just become very quiet and go off somewhere for awhile. Taysha thought that was what scared her most. There was that possibility he would just go off one day and not come back to her. His silence was louder than any yelling she had ever heard. Maybe it just better she asked if he wanted to come.

Back at her hut, telling Bahnu was easy. She didn't ask any questions. None at all. She knew Taysha was entrusting her with her children, Lover and home, and more importantly that she would be back like always. That was all that mattered to her.

For weapons Taysha had readied her javelin, small round shield and Kubu bow. She also pulled out her modesty armour thinking it would be the better choice for light traveling, while still impressive enough to make a statement that she wasn't one to trifle with.

For the run in the early spring she decided to put a summer tunic on under her armour. That would keep her legs cool for running and enabling her to take quick pee-breaks as they went. In her pack, she wrapped her thicker wool pants and a sleeveless sheep coat for night or if they had to climb any mountains. She collected the dried foods and a small wicker trap to put in the river on their way up, hopefully catching a fish or two for a fresh meal on the way back.

" . . . only . . ." Taysha said aloud as she sat down with her packed gear.

"Only?" asked Bahnu.

"I was just thinking. If we find those people. How can I communicate with them?"

"I just thought you'd just, you know... talk." Bahnu replied, "Maybe you should bring some cloths with your people's symbols on them."

Taysha looked at her javelin, pondering if it would provoke an attack in self defence.

" _If that happened, we run..."_ she rationalised, then stopped herself. There's no way she could even imagine her and Adit running from a fight. They both knew running would be just as dangerous as holding their ground. Of course it all depended on the number of attackers. And all this at least four days limp back to the village if they were wounded.

She thought again. Maybe they should ask someone else to come. This wasn't some romantic walk into the woods. Seeing one man and three female hunters doesn't mean there aren't more men. But, it was too late to decide those things now.

Taysha dug out the spare cloths from her basket and set to marking them with brush and dye. She wrapped and sewed a piece tightly around the small shield containing the Amazoi symbol of Life and Earth. That way she could identify herself and defend herself in the same motion.

Bajesh came back after dark a little drunk, and Taysha explained what she was planning to do.

"What? You two alone?"

"Unless someone wants come with us." she said and added, "How about you?"

She knew the tone of her voice couldn't conceal it was only a play at innocence.

"Uh ... I can't now. I'm taking care of the chores at Mother's. Brother is off hunting. Left this morning ... I also have sentry duty."

Taysha felt bad at being relieved to hear it, and even more so for taking the opportunity he gave her.

"I can't wait. If they go off over the mountain. It already been three days. Tomorrow is morning of fourth day. I'm sorry, I have to go."

Taysha realized the more she said the more it sounded like she was trying to convince herself. She felt she was saying more in the last ' _I'm sorry._ ' than she wanted to admit. It was too late now anyway. The decision had been made.

\- - - - -
Taysha woke early the next morning and walked around the outside of the village to approach the Training Grounds out of view of the sentries. There she found Adit already waiting, watching the mist rise off the field below.

"Anyone else coming?" he asked.

"No. We're enough," she answered without emotion.

"I guess the idea is to move as fast as we can," he confirmed and picked up his bag.

"Yes. I'm thinking, if they moving away from us. They maybe eight days away. Today. So every day is one day away. If we sit down for a day..."

"In other words, let's get off our asses and get out of here."

"Yes," she said with a smile.

Adit hoisted his light pack onto his back and they both scampered down the plateau of the Training Grounds and started with an easy run across the field and into the forest. The way down the ravine was a careful yet quick pace and they had made it to the bottom before the midday sun came over their heads. It was reassuring for Taysha to find she could reach the valley in less than a day and it wasn't the mischief of the gods that had played with her the day she burned the chairs.

The cool air contrasted with the heat from their running and it made her feel alive and powerful. The dew on the tall grass wetted the bottom of her tunic and bare legs as she followed Adit. She was proud that she had no trouble keeping up with him.

It wasn't long after the pains had started in her side that Adit stopped to rest and eat. She knew the familiar rest area well. It was the farthest point of her hunting trips with the other men, and it was the farthest north up the valley Taysha had ever gone. The new frontier made her feel as though she wanted to run some more, but her experience with the chair had taught her to take proper rests, especially to eat and drink.

She also knew not to sit for very long. She paced casually as she ate and drank, as did Adit. She noticed Adit was looking everywhere into the forest that she wasn't and vice-versa. Always scanning for potential enemies – perhaps even hoping for them.

They were a good pair in the field and in war.

On their way up the bending river they actually ran smack into a herd of deer. It was a family with a large buck and three females with two young. Both species were as shocked as the other at the sudden meeting, and Adit and Taysha stood ready to fight the buck, but the deer jumped away into the thickets.

"Typical," Adit said, shaking his head, obviously referring to his long-fruitless hunting trip seven days earlier.

By nightfall, and with the mumbled curses of Adit, they had passed two boars, but not much else.

"What about a fire?" Taysha asked as she slowed down to where Adit had stopped and dropped his pack.

"I haven't decided yet. What do you think?" he answered while he walked round the parameter of what was obviously going to be their camp for the night. They had stopped on the top of a little flat which led down to a sandy area of calm water by the river.

"How about we sleep here and put fire down there," she suggested with a point at the sandy patch below.

"Yeah," Adit answered half-heartedly, "I'm just wondering if we even need a fire. We won't be cooking anything. I'm actually thinking it would be better if we both spent the time preparing a comfortable bed and getting to sleep."

Taysha swayed her head to the sides in thought.

"Yeah. I guess we don't really need fire."

Adit took the shield off his back and pulled off his sweaty shirt. Taysha now wished she had chosen to wear pants as she was wrapped up in her modesty armour and the sweat-drenched tunic had become almost unbearable. The moment's hesitation to make herself more comfortable made her mad. Somewhere along the line, she had become more like the Wedic women concerning things like that. Or maybe it was because she didn't want to send the wrong message to Adit.

" _Ridiculous,_ " she cursed herself and undid the strap on her neck. Turning the breastpiece around, she undid the back strap and let it fall to the ground. She undid the leather string that held her loin-skirt and let it drop where she stood. She kept her back to Adit as she pulled off her wet tunic.

She couldn't help wondering if Adit had stolen a look, though the continuing sounds of cutting branches told her otherwise.

She pulled out her pants from her bag and put them and a thin Wedic shirt on to keep out the chill, then started helping with the work.

They built a little lean-to shelter from the side of the hill with the front open to keep watch. The top was added more for camouflage than for the need of stopping any rain. As Taysha collected branches for their bed she wondered how that night would end with her and Adit. She decided to put the constant scenarios to the back of her mind. Although the thought that she hadn't seen his cock yet crept in and she raised her eyes to the sky in disbelief of how she was always thinking about things like that.

By the time the shelter was finished, they were both feeling the long run in their legs. Although they were in good shape, it had been a while since they had run a full day and it was always a gruelling task no matter what condition one was in.

"So," asked Adit, "do you want to sleep at the back or the front?"

Taysha knew if she took the back, it would be a clear indication she wasn't wanting to ' _play_ '. Common sense dictated they would both lie in the shelter looking out the front as one wouldn't want to spend the night with his or her back open to the unknown.

If she took the front, that would mean he would be curled up to her.

Taysha found her heart beating as Adit waited for her answer. After all her unspoken thoughts and daydreams, she wasn't really sure if she wanted anything to happen. She enjoyed the relationship they had and wouldn't want to ruin it. But there was that constant, pounding, animal desire for him to take her. Ravage her. Fuck her.

If he did, she could then put aside the moralistic shame that accompanied her thoughts. Now Adit was placing it all in her control. It was hardly a situation she could excuse herself.
Then again, why would she be worried about having to explain anything to anybody? She was free to do as she liked and to have secrets if she liked.

"I'll sleep out front," she said.

"Alright," answered Adit simply.

The way he answered made Taysha wonder if he was even thinking the same as she was. Maybe she was just creating something out of nothing. Maybe it was just her.

They had brought their own sheepskins to sleep on and at first they had kept some distance from each other under their sleeping cloths. But as the night wore on and slowly unwound the ties of inhibition, they found themselves closer with Taysha's ass pressed up against Adit. She couldn't tell if it was she who had moved back or if it was he who had moved forward.

Most likely, it was a combination of the two.

She would pretend to shift positions in her sleep to rub her herself on Adit's cock. He was hard and he had slowly moved it in between the crevasse of her backside. Her heart started beating so loud she was sure he could hear it. Her whole body was shaking with the rhythm it made. There was no question of whether or not he could feel it.

Finally, she felt the touch of his hand on her side as he slowly brought it up under her arms. He reached around gently and brushed it over her breasts. She let out a breath of air that she felt she had been holding in for five years, and she pushed herself harder into him. She felt the tickling of his beard as he moved up and quietly kissed her on her neck and ear. She turned her head to receive his kiss. And to give hers in return.

"I've wanted this ever since I first met you," he whispered.

She realized that perhaps she had too.

"Yes..." she said simply and Adit slid his hand down to her hips and pushed down the top of her pants. As they continued kissing she wiggled her legs until she could pull the pants off with her toes.

She raised her top leg and placed it back over Adit's. She could feel the tip of his cock hit her anus and the excitement sent a rush of wetness between her legs. Adit reached around her front to guide things where they needed to go.
"You're soaked," he whispered and Taysha responded with a hard kiss.

He wasted no more time directing himself into her. She released her kiss in a gasp of passion and positioned herself to receive the most pleasure.

"Don't peak inside me," she whispered into her sheep fur.

"I won't," he assured her, "You peak for me. I want you to peak for me."

Bajesh had never said that to her. In fact, he usually said nothing at all. He had always ... well, most of the time, ensured her release. But with him, physical intimacy was a time of silence. It was something Taysha liked as well. It was like a secret, just between them.

But, hearing the words that Adit spoke to her that night excited her and released her inhibitions. A mixture of feelings flooded through her as he thrust into her.

"Feel my cock. Feel it inside you," he whispered harshly and rubbed her clit with his hand.

A rush of pleasure shot down into her legs and feet. She felt a tightness in her stomach as she pictured his cock sliding in and out of her.

Yes. She would peak for him.

And as many times as he wanted.

\- - - - -
In the morning, Taysha could tell by the light that they had already wasted some of the morning. The sun was still far behind the mountain they were at the foot of, but it was past sunrise for sure.

In any case, it was light and they were wasting it.

She crawled out of the shelter naked and bent back down to look for her loin-cloth and pants. She took a peak at Adit's cock noticing he was waking fully erect. Taysha remembered talking with Bahnu about why men were always hard in the morning. They came to no particular conclusion and left it as one of life's more interesting mysteries, though she figured it had some hidden meaning from the Goddess. Were people supposed to have sex in the morning? It hardly made sense to her. It was the time the breath smelled the worst. But, who knew these things?

Adit was up and packing almost too quickly for Taysha and she found herself being the one trying to catch up. They went down to the huge river for their morning washing and drink. They hadn't spoken to each other yet but when their eyes met while drinking they broke into a series of smiles and raised eyebrows at each other.

"Well, I had a FAN-tastic dream last night," Adit broke the silence loudly, "I'll tell you about it sometime."

At first Taysha thought he was serious and then the hidden meaning hit her and she smiled with a nod of understanding.

It was a dream. Of course, it was.

They grabbed their things and Adit took off running.

"Hey, wait!" Taysha whispered loudly to him as she put her water-skin into her pack. But, he didn't.

"Fine for you," she said to herself, "You didn't have to sleep on a cum-drenched fur."

She was soon on his heels and they ran much the same pace as they did the day before. All the while, the memories of last night replayed in Taysha's head.

"We're pretty close," Adit said at their final resting place. "We could get there tonight if you want to travel by dark."

"Ah, no." Taysha stood taking deep breaths with her hands resting on her knees. "I'm too tired to go farther and then make shelter."

So they made a shelter for the night, this time with a higher roof, as Taysha didn't want to hit her head when they made love.

By mid-morning the next day they stood across the river from where Adit and the others had seen the hunters. It took them the better part of the day finding a place to cross the steady flow of the spring-melted waters. When they got back to the place on the opposite side, Adit started searching for signs of a trail and Taysha unloaded one of her marked cloths. It had the circle with a line and two little circles, and underneath the raven, the symbol of her family. She was making a double cross shaped pole to hang it on when Adit came back beside her.

"In case they come back." she told him.

"Right. Good idea. I'm going to head up the mountainside a bit to make sure the trail doesn't disappear. Be right back."

Taysha kept her attention on binding the sticks as she gave him a nod.

When he had come back to Taysha, she was planting her pole at the clearing near the river and gathering rocks to keep it standing. He helped to pick up rocks while he told her about what he had seen.

"It looks to me as though they actually went over the mountain. There's no smoke or a decent place to camp on this side of the river. Too steep."

"What's on other side of this mountain?" she asked.

"Dunno. No one's ever gone that far. Our people came up the valley from the south," he added, pointing down river, "I know if we keep following the valley up river, it just ends around the bend. To the east. It's a couple more days' run. And believe me, it's not the area you'd want to live in. Shady, cold, rocky..."

Taysha looked up through the trees at the snow-topped pass between the northern mountains high above them.

"How long do you think it take to climb over?"

"Aaahhh!" Adit said unexpectedly, "No way. Sorry," he said bluntly knowing what she was really asking.

Taysha stood silent and was obviously mad.

"Hey. I'm sorry. We don't have the clothes to climb that. You need pants..."

"I have pants," she replied curtly.

"All right, I need pants. Winter pants. Besides, the ones you have would be soaked by the time we got to the pass."

He stopped and looked up at the mountains again.

" I don't know Taysha. Maybe they came up from the valley. It just looks like they've headed up and over and I can't see them walking up that, carrying their share of deer meat if they didn't have to. That's quite a burden. Don't you think?"

Taysha just stood there for a moment, not believing he would just give up. It's because they had sex. She was sure of it. It turned men into sheep.

" _Ass hole. I'll just go myself. Really. All I needed him for was to show me where it was."_

As if Adit could read her mind he said, "Do you have any more of those things?" he pointed to the banners.

"Two more," she answered coldly.

"All right, all right," he said and looked up towards the steep mountain peaks.

"How about this?" he offered, "We follow the trail until it hits the snow and you leave another one of the symbol-cloths there. We can tell any hunting parties from the village to come check it out now and again."

Taysha mulled over his proposition.

"And, honestly, I don't want to go over there to find a large group of very angry men with big sticks trying to poke us."

Taysha sighed, showing that his attempt to lighten the situation kind of worked.

"I'm also really concerned about why they would come all the way over here for food. If we go over and find a wasteland, with the amount of food we have ... not good, Taysha."

"I don't understand what 'wasteland' means," she mumbled at him stiffly.

"Uh, it just means no trees, no food, no birds, no animals. Look, Tash, we need food and we need a couple more people for sentry duty and what not."

It was logical and a decent offer.

"We can come back when the snow melts," Taysha said quietly raising her eyes up at the mountains without raising her head.

" _Before_ the snow melts, kid. Don't worry. There'll still be the path they made to get over. We'll find it and mark it, and head back for more supplies and men."

Adit noticed that she looked less mad and he summed up.

"Come on. You're cute when you're angry but we have work to do." With that he turned to walk up the trail he had just come down. Taysha lowered her gaze from the mountain pass and followed quietly.

It was as Adit first thought.

No caves, no veering to the left or right. The trail went straight up, give or take a zig or a zag to get around a clump of trees or cluster of boulders. Eventually they caught the distinct imprints of human tracks in the snow.

The climb had been steep and it made her run up the pass back home look like child's play. For the most part they had used their hands or javelins to climb up rather than walk up. Here the sun made the snow blinding and there was a cold breeze coming off it that cut through her clothes. The ground below the snowline was spongy and muddy and her pants were dirty and drenched from the knees down. Taysha now agreed with Adit's worries about why that tribe needed to come this far for food. Perhaps it best they go back and return later on.

She posted her second banner and made a line of rocks to mark the trail they had just climbed up. After a few moments' pause, as Taysha looked around, it was evident there was nothing more to be done and she turned and led the way back.

The path down was less obvious and they had moved off course a couple of times and ended up coming out downriver from the first banner she had planted. They moved back up stream to the crossing and started the run back home. When they were across from her banner, Taysha stopped and put her last marked fabric directly across the river from the first and led a trail of rocks in the direction they would go.

"I hope this doesn't bring another Kubu tribe onto us," mentioned Adit as she was adding the last few stones.

She exhaled and looked up at him.

"I hope so too."

Adit shrugged back at her. They couldn't stay hidden forever. And it would be nice to make ties with a friendly people before the next generation of Kubu came knocking at their gates.

Taysha finished the last of the rock line and they started to head back. Although she was tempted to just let Adit go home while she head back over the mountain by herself, the reality of her sharing nothing with the unknown tribe but a few symbols and similar boots was enough to convince her to return. Not to mention the lack of proper clothing and food.

They had covered six days of ground in three nights and they were both very tired. The running, climbing and love-making had begun to wear on both of them. Taysha figured they could handle fighting a party of four but any more than that and they would lose to their own fatigue.

The way back was as uneventful as the trip up, though this time they built fires and Taysha regretted not taking the time to lay the fish trap. On their last night, they stayed on the same ridge they had on the first night out. It was a source of pride to them both that they had not broken pace. Taysha had hoped to be able to spend the last night in passion with Adit but their time together resulted in a snuggle and falling asleep.

Taysha was woken by Adit violently shaking her.

"Hunting party!" was all he said before scrambling for his belongings in the shelter, "Shits, shits, shits..." he whispered in a panic as dragged his sleeping-furs out from underneath Taysha.

"Ow. What? What's wrong?"

"Wayu and Natu and I don't know who else ... they've obviously seen the smoke from the fire. They're a breath away."

He threw his sleeping-furs beside the fire as quietly as he could and laid them out with his feet as he dressed.

"My bow, my bow..." his harsh whisper became shrill as the footsteps of the approaching men told them they were right below them. Taysha scrambled around in the shelter and tossed it out to him as she pulled on her tunic.

"Pretend you're asleep," he practically mouthed to her, "And when you wake up, pretend that you're really, really tired from a long trip."

Taysha was enjoying the look of absolute panic on his face. It was an Adit she had never seen. She couldn't resist.

"I am pretty tired, but not from trip," she whispered back with a naughty look. She laughed to herself as Adit stood with fingers locked in a mock strangle on her neck. She just smiled and lay down with her back to Adit as he scrambled to pick up a stick to poke the fire with.

Soon enough, Taysha could hear the footsteps and voices of the men as they entered into the camp. The voices of Wayu and Natu were soon joined by the other two members, Tapal and Bajesh.

Taysha lay motionless with her eyes open, looking for reflections or shadows to read off the shelter wall. The sound of Bajesh greeting Adit put a knot of fear and anger in her stomach.

" _Why of all the people ... gods be damned!"_

"Hey," Adit greeted them in a whisper, pretending not to wake Taysha.

"We've been looking for you!" Natu said casually.

"Ssshhhh. Taysha's sleeping," came Adit's reply.

"What took you so long?" whispered Wayu.

Taysha tried to figure out why Wayu would say that. Hadn't Adit told anyone where they were going?

It was Adit's mock laugh that told her it had been a joke.

"We weren't expecting to run into you for another day or two," Wayu added, confirming his attempt at humour.

"We ran all the way there and back," Adit mentioned in his usual annoying, pompous manner, "We got to where we saw the hunting party and kept following up the river hoping to find a camp of some kind. That was a total waste of time. Time and energy and food. Yeah, speaking of that, do you guys have anything? We're down to our last bits here."

"Yeah sure, have some of mine," offered Natu as he dropped his pack beside Adit.

Bajesh stood looking over at the back of the sleeping Taysha. She could feel his eyes on her.

"Is she all right?" he asked Adit.

"Oh, her? Are you kidding? Fine. Well, fine in body." he lowered his voice in a show of concern yet still loud enough for Taysha to work with later.

"She seemed really disappointed that we didn't find anything. She's been pretty dark and quiet the whole trip back."

" _Got it,_ " Taysha thought, " _I know what to do from there._ "

"So, anyway," he continued, "We went as far as we could and came back to the original spot and searched for their trail. Yeah, I know, I know," he said holding his hands up as if to stop any interruption, "we should have done that first. But, at the time, there only seemed one place they could have gone."

"Where'd they go then?" asked Wayu.

"Up," Adit said simply, "Up and over the mountain."

"The one in the far corner!?" Natu added pointing to the distant ridge of mountains barely visible through the trees.

Natu's comment was just loud enough for Taysha to make her entrance.

"Hey, be quiet." she moaned as she rolled over just enough to give the order and then rolled back to 'sleep'.

Bajesh went over to her and lay beside her.

" _Goddess do you do this now to punish me?"_ Taysha thought as Bajesh snuggled closer and put his arm over her. She let her eyes close. What else could she do?

"Anyway. Yeah, over those mountains," Adit continued, "It's a shit climb and still cold as your grandmother's cunny."

Adit was back into full-character already.

"Ha! Well, you would know Grandma, obviously," threw back Wayu.

"Aaag," Adit reacted in distaste at losing the battle of wit.

"In any case," he continued, "Taysha wanted to come back and get proper supplies and a few more men before climbing over. How about you guys?"

" _Why did he say it was my idea?"_ Taysha wondered, _"To show it was a good idea by making himself a supporter of it."_ she answered her own question and smiled to herself at her secret admiration for the man's use of tactics in all situations.

"What? Just, you mean, go back to the village with you and then back up to the ... over there?" stumbled Natu.

"If you want to, man. It's not a command from Council or Anami. In fact, I'm not even going to mention it to either of them."

"Why not?" asked Wayu.

"There's the question of bringing back a hostile tribe to our door. I don't think anyone wants a repeat of that again."

The others nodded silently.

"So, if you're not coming, you're keeping your mouth shut. We can't keep it quiet forever, but we'll need to just as long as it takes Taysha to get ready to leave again."

"I'm pretty sure Anami already knows about the hunting party." Natu added.

"Yeah, he does. But if he's not asking any questions. It may be because he doesn't want to know."

"Yeah. Fine. I'll go," said Wayu with a shrug.

"What about you, Natu?" asked Adit.

"Well, you're really the Master-of-Arms now, so sure, I guess. I'll have to tell the wife it's an order from you though."

Adit ignored his last comment and looked over to where Bajesh and Taysha lay under the shelter.

"I'm pretty sure Bajesh is coming," he half-questioned in their direction.

Bajesh responded by quietly raising his hand in a show of affirmation.

"Great. That's six of us, right Tapal?" Adit concluded as he looked at Tapal who gave a head-bobble in a non-committing agreement.

Bajesh half rolled over and said quietly, "I've got to make sure my brother is there for Mother and Grandmother. I'm fine after that's been taken care of."

"Yeah. I've got to take care of some stuff too," said Natu.

"Stuff? Since when have you got _stuff_?" Adit joked as he stood up, "Taysha!" he called, "Come on, girl. Wake up. We're wasting sunlight."

\- - - - -
When they finally got to the edge of the forest at the Wedic field, the group found Anami and Ariya teaching at the Training Grounds. They could tell by the way the two stood at the corner of the grounds, waiting, that there was something up.

Sure enough, Anami suddenly started scolding Adit for having taken off on his little adventure. All Adit said was in his defence that he couldn't have let her go by herself, which was what she most likely would have done.

Taysha wasn't questioned or scolded, but the knowing look that Anami gave her seemed to be the harsher burden to bear.

The obvious futility of a man and woman trying to explain why they had disappeared together for seven days hit her like a rock. She knew Bajesh must know as well and she started to feel sick.

But more important at that moment was Anami's forbidding Adit to do something like that again. They couldn't very well have their Master-of-Arms running around the mountains if something happened in the village.

Taysha knew his rebuke of Adit carried over to her in an indirect way. There seemed to be an unspoken anger from Anami that she suspected came from not being consulted.

Another rift had occurred between them.

Still, the most important thing on her mind at the moment was to take a hot, Amazoi bath, more to ensure there was no smell of Adit left on her than for cleanliness. She had kept herself clean enough by splashing up the cold river water between her legs every morning. But she needed a hot pool of water to sit in.

With Anami having spoken his peace, the group of six walked up to the village together. There Natu didn't get off any easier than Adit. His wife's mother questioned why they had come back from hunting empty-handed when the barbarian girl and Adit were obviously fine.

"What of the meat?" she asked.

Bajesh and Taysha exchanged looks of pity and understanding with Natu as they left him to his mother-in-law. They went directly to her hut and Taysha headed straight to the bath.

Back in the village, Natu's mother-in-law wasn't the only one who noticed the empty hands of the hunting party.

The Council called the four to assemble and explain.

The knock on Taysha's door came at a most inappropriate time for the couple.  
"Yeah! All right!" yelled back Bajesh to the unknown messenger outside, "Tell them I'll be there right away!"

"Damn," he whispered to Taysha. He was still inside her and could feel his erection starting to subside.

"You finish," Taysha whispered. "I'll wait until you're back."

Bajesh felt his cock harden at her coaxing and they pumped him to a quick finish, covering her belly.

Taysha noticed the amount released, showing her how he had been waiting for her. The fact it should have added to her guilt didn't evade her. But she felt no worse about coupling with Adit than she did with Bahnu. Or for that matter, with Tapal, the other possible father of her first child.

When Bajesh left to meet with the Council, Taysha sat and pondered the unwritten laws of Right and Wrong and came to the conclusion these things were in the hands of the Goddess. That way, she admitted, she didn't have to worry about it any longer.

Her mind was quickly filled with what the Council was going to say to Bajesh. She quickly dressed, and ran to the village to make sure the Council didn't do anything to stop her from making contact with the unknown tribe.

She found Mother with Shaymo and Pierla outside Mother's hut. She stayed with them as the Council talked to Bajesh and the others in the privacy of the Council Hut.

Eventually, the Council came out and announced a public debate. Taysha had not seen such a thing since she was the subject of turmoil. It was a surprise to find her and Adit's action had merited such a course of action.

Elder Dinesh, with Anami sitting by his side, rebuked the four members of the hunting party individually and then as a group about their blatant disregard for their duties.

"Hunting parties can't just come back when they feel like it," the second senior council member addressed them.

"Years ago, when we put limit to four days, some lazy bugs would go and lay in the field for three days and come back all brown-skinned with a few rabbits that happened across their path."

Some of the Council members seemed to look around at the surrounding group as if to eye the past-offending parties.

"Everyone started assuming that the next hunting party would catch something," the councilman continued, "and our meat supplies suffered because of this thinking."

"You understand we can't have this," finished Councilman Dinesh.

"You know by law, we could have you caned," added the first speaker.

The seriousness of the last statement seemed to close the court and Senior Dinesh pointed to the four members of Bajesh's hunting party.

"Go back to your huts, get your hunting gear, go and don't come back until you have enough meat to share," he shooed them on with a wave of his hand.

The crowd dispersed and returned to their previous chores while the four met Taysha in the middle and led her out of earshot from the others as they contemplated their situation.

"Why they didn't say anything to me?" Taysha practically squealed, but her protest was ignored.

"Now what?" Bajesh asked with a quick glance at Taysha. Her pursed lips and large eyes said what her mouth didn't have time to.

"Uh..." Natu broke in," After that, I don't think we should go without telling Council at all, or at least without Anami knowing. I really don't want to be caned."

"No one's going to cane you, stupid," Wayu scoffed.

"Either way we don't have time to talk about it." Bajesh hurriedly tried to wrap up the conversation, noticing the Council members standing outside Dinesh's hut looking back at them.

"We'll figure it out in the forest," he added before walking away, "Taysha, get your things ready to go, and meet us back here. If anyone asks, tell them you're coming to help us hunt."

Taysha's look of anger melted quickly, seeing as Bajesh was taking action in her favour. She gave him a quick nod before turning and running off to once again collect her things.

This time she readied supplies for a longer trip.

She returned to find the four hunters talking with Adit and Brother. When Taysha approached, Adit greeted her with a shrug. Who would have known? As far as he could tell, it had nothing to do with the two of them. But, he did suggest the hunters go back up to where Taysha had placed the marker.

He told them about the deer and boar they had seen on the way up. If they caught something, two of them could carry it back while Bajesh, Taysha and one other could continue onwards. No one would object to that. After all, the problem wasn't that Taysha was off trying to find some unknown party, the problem was the hunting party had neglected to fulfill its obligation.

Brother joined the group of hunters and they set out.

It would be he and Natu that would bring back any kills.

That would mean Taysha, Bajesh and Wayu would proceed onward and over the northern pass after they found their game. It was a lot fewer than the original six men but they weren't going for a fight. They would follow the trail as quickly and as quietly as possible until they found the origins of the three-woman group. They would figure out what to do from there when they observed the situation.

As they made their way down the ravine to the lower valley, Taysha remembered Adit standing on the Training Grounds before they left, shrugging as he whispered to her,

"I hate to be the one to say it. And you know I wouldn't normally," Adit said casually, "but I got a mouthful of shit from Anami about being away so long. Ariya was all teary-eyed about having to teach the kids for more than three straight days. Anyway, I doubt I can get away with a twenty-day excursion or whatever it will take, without support from them."

" _Twenty days..._ " she repeated the words in her head. She hadn't thought it would be that long. But if they walked out nine days and spent two nights watching the tribe, it could very well be as many as that. She tried to picture in her head what a wasteland would be like. She imagined it to be similar to the huge rock slide that lay on the other side of her mountain, only just vast emptiness as far as the horizon.

At the point when she could no longer imagine the unlimited nothing of an unknown place, her mind drifted back to her last conversation with Adit before Bajesh and the others had found them on their last day together.

"I don't take shits by the word of Council," Adit said as he lay with his arm around Taysha, "But Anami? Yeah. I think we should at least tell Anami."

"Oh gods!" Taysha rolled her eyes to the roof of their little shelter, "That means Anami tells Council and there will be debate ... like this, blah-blah-blah!" she imitated with googly eyes, "It will last days. The snow will go. The grass will grow. And trail will be lost. Thank you. Great idea."

Adit rubbed his hand across his face as he looked from her eyes, to her lips, down her topless body to the cloth wrapped around her waist.

"I like you, kid. You know that..."

The words sent a bit of an increase in her heartbeat.

"But I can't give up everything I've worked hard for, over one night with you. Not even an eternity of nights... I'm next in line from Anami. He's chosen me as the Master-of-Arms. But, he would choose someone else if I prove unreliable. I couldn't imagine him giving the posi..."

He was interrupted by Taysha rolling towards him,

"Wait. Wait ... I think I know Anami better than you," she said.

"Oh really?" he replied, looking rather bemused.

"Yes. You think when after this, when we come back to village, Anami will not think you did good thing for me? An honour thing?"

"I see what you're saying, Tash..." he said as he lay back on his sheep skin, "All right, I'll go. I'll go. But, only if there's no problem when we get back."

"You all right, Tasha?" Wayu asked, abruptly bringing her out of her thoughts and back into the present.

"It's Tay-sha," she responded with a frown, "Not Ta-sha."

Wayu was one of the few people in the tribe that called her that and it was annoying at the best of times, mostly because he hadn't bothered to correct himself after all these years.

Wayu gave a little shrug at the sudden snap from her and followed after Brother. Taysha looked around. She found herself at the end of the group as they marched in single file. They still hadn't made it to the bottom of the ravine.

Taysha rethought her reaction to Wayu's question and ran to catch up and pinched the cloth of his shirt sleeve to slow him.

"Sorry, Wayu. I'm all right," she said with a brief smile.

Wayu smiled back, "Good ... good."

He turned to keep his eyes on the trail and they walked on as he and Brother talked back and forth.

The first purpose of the journey was to find game, so they moved slowly and stopped before sunset to set up camp. By Taysha's reckoning, they were less than half the distance she and Adit had covered in their first day. It seemed her unspoken feelings about their slow pace had been picked up by the others.

"Why don't you just go?" Brother said to her as they sat around the campfire eating, "I mean, you don't need to stay in the hunting party do you? Two people can kill a deer as easy as five can." he added, pointing his knife to himself and Natu.

"If we're not back in time for certain duties," Natu interjected, "Things get fired up."

Brother turned the palms of his hand up in the air to show confusion. "What does that even mean?"

Natu just shrugged and looked away.

"I understand what you're saying," Bajesh offered Natu, "but, I also know that the sooner we get moving, the sooner we get back."

He was obviously referring to the three of them that would be continuing over the mountain.

"And we can try and kill something on the way back," Wayu added, "That would ease the anger of the Council if we brought back an extra boar or deer or something."

Regardless of Natu's uneasy feeling, Brother's point was valid. They certainly didn't need to stay together.

Eventually Natu's head wobbling caught their attention.

"You're right, you're right," he admitted, "We should split up so Taysha can find her tribe as quickly as possible."

\- - - - -
Taysha, Bajesh and Wayu headed out before sunrise the next morning. The journey of the three started strong but Taysha was soon held back by the two men struggling under their heavy packs. Especially Bajesh.

Taysha couldn't complain. She felt that she had over- packed herself. It was too hot to wear the winter pants which were on her back. Her pack also carried her wolf skin, an extra sleeping-fur and two waxed cloths. It was all tied onto a thick wooden frame and it felt as though she was carrying a fully grown sheep.

The other two weren't faring any better with the cooking pots and extra water skins. Going hunting for three or four days was one thing but preparing for at least ten days or more was another thing altogether. Taysha figured the most meaningless weight was the water. At least when they were hunting they could drink as they moved on their hunt. But all three were preparing for days without water in the possible wasteland above the pass. In frustration, Taysha had them empty all the water out. They would have plenty of chance to fill them again from the countless streams from the top of the mountain. She was starting to doubt the existence of this supposed wasteland anyway. She wanted to get them to leave behind the heavier waxed cloths, saying they could all sleep in the same hut, but Wayu was adamant about sleeping on his own.

By the second night, they had reached the camping site where Taysha and Adit first made love. It seemed like a lifetime ago. Adit already felt like a distant memory.

As he had said, it had just been a dream.

By the time they got to the river's edge across from Taysha's banner, it was the fourth day since they had set out and the sun was beginning to set yet again. There was no sign that anyone had seen her cloth message. Taysha led her companions up to the river-crossing and back down to spend the night near the banner. Another hot day had drawn to an end and the sweat-soaked fabric on their backs was starting to absorb the cold from the river.

As they collected wood and readied their shelter, Taysha tried to count the days from when Adit and the others had first seen the strangers.

More than ten, close to twenty.

She cursed herself for wasting three days fucking Adit. A nice time, but the wrong time. The other full day at the village was wasted while she waited for the troubles to be sorted out. She didn't even want to think of the day she had thrown away drinking after just hearing of this mysterious hunting party.

Standing on the same spot she had been on over six days ago, she questioned her letting Adit talk her into going back to the village. If she was going to face an entire tribe on the other side of the mountain, a couple of extra people weren't going to help all that much. As for food? A river at her feet and a bow on her shoulder, what else could she possibly want?

The face of the cliff caught the sun for the remainder of the day and she wanted to climb up to see how much snow remained. By the look of the cloudless sky there would be just as much sun tomorrow. The frustration of being so close to the mountain and not making it that day flooded over her.

"Hey," she said to the other two, "why, in the name of the gods, did we bring this shit? So much!" She once again brought up the topic with a sweep of her hand over their backpacks.

"You might be thankful for it tomorrow." Bajesh responded and went back to making the fire.

" _You're such a cock sometimes,"_ she thought back at him.

He had such a dry, practical character now. He always ruined the chance of a few good jokes or banter. Bajesh just wasn't the type. She was starting to understand the problems with loving more than one man – you end up wishing each was more like the other.

\- - - - -
Taysha was up before the others at about dawn.

She put her pants on and softly kicked the others awake.

"Come on," she mumbled sleepily, "If we leave now, we'll be at top before midday."

" _Without the packs, we'd be there a lot sooner,"_ she complained in her head.

The two men mutely gathered up their things. It was apparent with Taysha standing at the forest edge chewing on her piece of smoked boar that there would be no hot breakfast that morning. The two guys took too long at breakfast and it really annoyed Taysha. She had told them before that they were worse than a couple of old women to hunt with. Before they were completely ready she turned and proceeded up the hill. They were ready enough by her standards. Too slow in the first place, in her opinion.

The climb was worse than she remembered. It was steep and the melting snows had made the entire side of the mountain soggy under the moss, pine needles and mud. They were cold and drenched all down the front by the time the sun had found its way into the valley.

All this time she had been carrying the equivalent of a large child on her back and the weight now seemed to be pulling her back down the mountain. By midday they were still only half way up. It seemed a constant battle between the heat of carrying the packs and the cold of the freshly melting snow. At one point Taysha sat waiting for the other two in a puddle of water, welcoming the coolness as it seeped in through the stitching of her boots.

The three struggled, sweat, and cursed their way just above the tree line where the snow had been the last time Taysha was there. She was surprised to see how much it had melted already. The first shoots of small flowers were now growing around her second banner. The sun was well past midday but it was obvious they would make it to the top and down to the trees on the other side of the mountain by nightfall. The only problem might be finding a place to sleep.

It was actually better the snow had melted so much because it would have been an even more bitter climb to the top otherwise.

When they first reached the firmly packed ice, it provided a welcome footing for them but it soon turned to slush in the heat and forced them to trudge through a thigh-high path which they took turns cutting out. Taysha was damn tempted to leave the pack and pick it up on the way back, but the lack of complaints from the other two set her resolve and she pressed onwards. Still, she was worn out before reaching the top and Wayu ground his way past her.

"Taysha! Taysha! Get up here. Just drop your pack!" he shouted down to her from the top of the pass.

She didn't need that instruction repeated.

She sat down in the butt-high snow and fixed the wooden ends of her pack frame into it. The instant she did, the release from the heavy load gave her renewed energy and she scrambled past Bajesh and up to where Wayu stood at the point between the joining mountains. On each side stood the peaks high above her like giant sentries. Behind her, the deep valley they had just climbed up was in stark contrast to the wide flat valley that lay on the north side. It was now clear that the unknown hunting party had come down the south side more to explore rather than to actually hunt. The north side was far from a wasteland. A blanket of trees covered the valley floor and the biggest lake Taysha had ever seen sat in the far distance. Wayu stood pointing to a sight that started Taysha's heart beating rapidly.

There, close to the lake, were three thin columns of smoke.

Taysha instantly started to map out possible routes in her head and estimated the time it would take to get there. There was more snow on the north side of the mountain and it looked like a couple of days' journey to the source of the fires. A cold wind hit Taysha's wet back as Bajesh joined the two at the top.

"Let's go," she said.

"Let's rest," responded Bajesh and he took off his pack and stretched his back.

"Bah!" was her only reply as she turned around. She knew well enough to try to start a verbal debate with a Wedic.

"Hey, look!" Wayu's sudden comment caused Taysha to stop. He stood pointing at the ground, just left of where they stood. It was the original trail made by the unknown hunting party.

It went down the opposite side of the mountain, still visible in the shady northern side of the cliffs.

Taysha looked down to her pack. It was a lot farther away than she remembered it being. With every step back towards it the wind got colder as her sweat cooled. The pack seemed to have been loaded with rocks since she left it. The weight pushed her down into the already trodden path with each step.

She got back up to Wayu and Bajesh and continued past them. She could hear Bajesh sigh as she passed. Wayu gave his companion a pat on the shoulder in support as he followed after Taysha. Bajesh slung his pack on his shoulders and carried on. The three were relieved to find the hardened path made for a much easier descent. The north face was frozen and it was like walking down rocks. At least this on this side of the mountain they had a better chance to find a dry, level place to sleep that night.

The pain from the climb down reminded Taysha of her escape from the Hoorg so many years ago. The pressure from her pack worked her shin muscles and strained her thighs. There was more snow on this side and it followed them well into the forest below. From there the forest floor was covered in soaked moss and old pine needles, but at least the grade was not so steep. Thankfully, they found a suitable place to sleep that evening well before it started getting dark. The speed of their descent convinced Taysha they would be at the source of the smoke by the next day.

They decided against making a fire for obvious reasons. True to Bajesh's words, Taysha was thankful for the extra supplies in their packs as they were all able to change into dry clothes. They built a quick shelter around the base of a tree and huddled underneath with their backs to the trunk and Taysha in the middle.

"What do we do now?" Wayu asked, seemingly just making conversation.

"I'm going and talk with them," Taysha stated the obvious.

"Maybe we should come back with more people," Bajesh suggested. The comment made Taysha turn to him.

"What? Why do you say this now?"

"I'm just thinking ... this isn't something you want to do with three people."

Taysha scoffed and sat speechless for a moment.

"You say this now..." she repeated with a hint of disgust.

Bajesh turned to face her.

"You have daughters now, Taysha. You can't be running off and just talking to tribes you know nothing about."

"You can come or return to your daughters," Taysha snapped back, "But you know we do not have anything for long. The Goddess gives and the gods take. Like my family. Like your father."

Taysha drove her heels into the earth before continuing, "Right now Shaymo and Pierla are fine with Mother and Bahnu. They will be fine without me. Or you. This is sad, but true. Maybe this is Bahnu's destiny." She stopped to let her words sink in and looked out into the darkness.

"That's foolishness," Bajesh retorted, "We don't just do stupid things and then blame it on the gods. You do that too much, Taysha."

Taysha turned to argue when Wayu cut in with a firm nudge in her side.

"All right you two, that's enough," he ordered, "Bajesh, Taysha is in command of this, not you or me. If you didn't think this through from the beginning, that's unfortunate for you. But it's too late now. Unless you decide to turn and leave us, which I don't think you'll do."

"Thank you," Taysha slipped in.

Wayu turned back to looking at the surrounding darkness before adding, "If I had words for you Taysha, it would be about your caring for your daughters... But that isn't for here and now."

What Wayu said stung Taysha, but she sat quietly as she chewed on his words.

The three spent their night in a state of waking and sleeping until Taysha opened her eyes to see the light in the sky and Wayu and Bajesh huddled beside her, sound asleep.

\- - - - -
Taysha had found herself too nervous to eat as they stood at the camp organising themselves. They had decided to leave their packs there in favour of easy moving. The two men chose to take just their bows in case there was need of a hasty retreat. Taysha slung hers on the back of her wolf skin. She took her javelin as her main weapon and carried her small metal shield on her arm with her people's symbol of Life still attached to it.

Because her modesty armour had not back for her short sword, she had it sheathed behind her shield.

"Cursed shit," Taysha swore.

"What's wrong?" asked Bajesh.

"Ah, I should have brought banner from the river. Stupid!" she berated herself.

"It's all right. You have the main mark on your shield there," Bajesh pointed out.

"Yes, I know this, but it is not only one. It's maybe ... ah, phooey." She flipped her hands to show the matter was closed and they headed out towards the strangers' village.

It seemed to take forever as they stalked through the underbrush. The sounds of Taysha's own heart seemed exceedingly loud. They ate and drank as they went. Every time Taysha took a sip from her water-flask she thought of Bajesh's comment about being grateful for not having dumped most of their things. She caught herself in an imagined argument with him. It quickly tired her. She hated the constant fights with others that she had in her mind.

Taysha looked up at the sky through the trees. It was obvious they wouldn't get to this village and back before dark. But her mind was too full of other things to worry about. Where they would sleep or whether or not they might get lost.

Eventually the smell of the smoke greeted them and the pace that Taysha felt was too slow from the beginning now drew to a crawl. At the first sight of the huts about an arrow's shot away from the tree line, Taysha was overcome with a nervousness that halted her and she stood waiting for the shaking to leave her knees.

Bajesh, sensing the strangeness of her hesitancy, quietly made his way to her side.

" I know you will be mad," she whispered to Bajesh. "But you will wait on flanks. No nonsense. This is battle so you must listen to me." she cut out all options for debate, "I will go straight through grass and scout. Bajesh wait behind this tree."

She turned to Wayu and made the hand-signals for him to wait and keep watch. He nodded in understanding and kept in a half-crouch as he scanned the area. Taysha could see Bajesh had noticed her shaking, yet he said nothing.

"If I am in trouble I will run to that small tree... between then come back straight from there. Don't shoot me." she waved a finger at him in emphasis.

Though her eyes returned to the village ahead, she could still see Bajesh staring at her blankly.

"May the gods be at your shoulder." she finished the talk.

"The G _oddess_ at your shoulder," replied Bajesh, knowing what the change in words meant for Taysha.

Taysha looked at her dear lover and friend as if to see him one last time. Without a word, she pulled the wolf head onto her head and fastened the leather straps around her chin. For some reason, she glanced down at Bajesh's fingers keeping the arrow on its string. It was the same arm which the wolf she wore had bitten. There was a flood of things she wanted to say, mixed with things she wanted Bajesh to say. But, there was no time for further words and Taysha started to sneak off into the low brush and grasses that separated them from the huts.

She had reached up to the last three or four clumps of high grasses between her and the camp when she stopped for a proper look. There were only about five huts, from what she could see. She figured there were more beyond the curve of the hill, towards the lake.

As she remained crouching behind the grass, a sudden feeling of recognition swept over her.

"Goddess!" she whispered to herself as she looked over the huts. There was no doubt this tribe shared a common ancestry to her own. The wooden dome shaped huts looked exactly like those in her old village. She even noticed that all the entrances didn't face each other.

Taysha crawled over to see between the huts and saw a group of women by the fire preparing the meat of a goat.

A group of children chased each other around the small camp. The children and the older women had black hair like Taysha and, unlike the Wedic, they were fair skinned like herself. After so many years of seeing only dark skinned people, these light-skinned women with their small noses seemed strange to her.

Then the weirdest thing happened. She was sure she recognized one of the women.

" _Impossible!_ "

She dared not hope.

The gods were obviously trying to deceive her.

" _Wait, and that other one..._ " she thought as she stood up and absentmindedly started walking towards them.

" _That ... that's my aunt._ "'

Taysha's mind fell into a storm. She had to consciously stop herself from fainting as she kept moving forwards.

"Aunty! Aunty!" Taysha cried out, her voice cracking under the heaviness of her feelings.

The children suddenly screamed in unison.

The women turned and jumped to their feet as they raised the alarm. It hadn't even registered to Taysha that they had spoken in her language. Another of the women started calling out a man's name.

"Rafeltu! Rafeltu!"

"It's me!" Taysha yelled over the uproar, sounding as if she had just finished running to the top of a mountain.

"It's me, Taysha." she practically pleaded.

The dawn of recognition crept across her aunt's face.

"Gods..." she exhaled as she dropped her skinning blade, "It's really you," her aunt whispered as she stepped within speaking distance, "Oh, the gods be honoured!"

Without any more words or hesitation the two ran together and embraced. Taysha's legs started shaking so badly she found she couldn't stand any longer. Without a word, Taysha and her mother's sister fell to their knees.

\- - - - -
The tribe, Taysha's tribe, gathered around her.

It just so happened that Taysha had arrived after a successful hunt and all the members were there. Taysha was overjoyed to find Vlosha and Wofala among them. Vlosha was one of her old friends, a winter younger, and they too took time to embrace and share tears of joy. Wofala was three winters older and since she had Come of Age and subsequently married, she had been separated by social status from Taysha's group. But, Taysha remembered her quiet kindness when they played as children. It felt strange to be so grown up now. Taysha could only imagine what she now looked like to them.

There were so many questions to ask, but first so many tears to fall. She was embraced by every adult. They all knew who Taysha was even though she wasn't recognisable as the young woman of 14 winters. Taysha knew most of them only as her parent's friends.

The younger children of the village watched in curiosity at this strange visitor who spoke their language. She recognized one boy, Utol the son of Rafeltu, but the others had either been babies during the Hoorg attack or been born after that time. Rafeltu was the only older man she could see. He stood outside the group, his eyes moving from Taysha to the woods around them.

She could sense his caution but the immediate emotions occupied her for the moment. Taysha looked for more among them related to her. But there were none. The tears from this realization mixed with those that fell out of joy and relief.

"Come child," her aunt said as she started to stand, "Let's sit properly by the fire."

"It's so funny I can understand you all," Taysha said with a short laugh. She suddenly remembered Bajesh and Wayu.

"Oh, wait. Wait," she said, wiping her nose with the leg of her wolf skin, "I have to get my friends."

As several hands helped her to stand, a couple of the women made comments about the size of her arms.

" _I guess I've changed a bit,_ " she reminded herself, knowing there would be plenty of time to explain everything later. She went to where she could see her two companions still wisely hiding behind tree and shrub. She motioned for them to come out, which they did and stood bug-eyed at her.

"It's all right!" she called out in Wedic, "They're from my tribe! They _are_ my tribe!"

She felt hesitant to even say it aloud, as if it would break a magic spell and they would all disappear. But, she turned to see them standing behind her and she had to put her trembling hands over her mouth to stop herself from wailing. Once again her legs gave way and she sat in the earth between the two groups sobbing and crying. Her aunt and others rushed to her side as the two dark skinned men with bows walked closer.

At the nervous looks from the women, Bajesh and Wayu shouldered their weapons. The only male in the Amazoi crowd stepped out and approached them. He held out his arm in greeting to Bajesh who was one step ahead of Wayu. Although Bajesh was unfamiliar with this greeting, he gently took the man's hand. Rafeltu had expected to be grabbed on the forearm but it was obviously the visitor's way of greeting. He held Bajesh's hand in return and smiled. The sight sent Taysha's lip quivering again. She didn't know what to say.

As they approached the village, another Amazoi man of Age came running up after a younger woman who had obviously gone to fetch him. He was a taller, lean man around the same age as Rafeltu. Both of them seemed to be between the years of a young man and the years of the Grey Hairs. The four men of the two tribes exchanged grasps and smiles of relief.

"Do you speak any of our language?" Rafeltu asked, rationalizing they must have communicated with Taysha enough for her to call them friends.

"A little," answered Bajesh with a surprised look from Wayu.

"What was that?" asked Wayu quietly.

"He was asking if we spoke his language."

"Hmph." he looked back at Bajesh with a raised brow, impressed by his skill.

Bajesh shrugged. He had never thought it would be useful beyond one day understanding what his daughters were telling each other in secret.

Taysha was still hugging and being hugged by those around her.

"This has to be a dream. This has to be a dream," she kept repeating.

"If it is," added Rafeltu, "then we are all experiencing it together. Come by the fire and sit. Gelvloa, fix some tea for our most honoured guests."

"Yes, father," one of the younger women replied. Taysha knew her. Before she could turn and prepare the drinks Taysha called out to her.

"You're Gelvloa? Wow ... you've grown, haven't you?"

A smile was Gelvloa's only reply before going off to get the mint tea. Taysha kind of remembered her from the younger group. The girl was about seven Winters behind Taysha.

She was Rafeltu's eldest daughter.

As they sat by the fire, the only elder woman in the group continued to prepare the goat meat for smoking and drying while the others talked.

"Who else was with you?" one woman asked.

"No one. I was ... I mean, there were..." Taysha was going to tell them about hiding with Tara and her lover until it suddenly hit her that Tara was her aunt's daughter, "There were Hoorg still waiting, hiding. They ... I didn't see anyone else make it. I don't know," she trailed off in thought.

"It's all right. You don't need to explain," comforted Rafeltu.

It seemed to Taysha that Rafeltu was the obvious leader. She remembered before the attack some people talking about how he had moved out of the village after their hut-burning raid on the Hoorg. He had become something of a novelty and the punch line of various jokes back then.

"Are you the man who moved out of the village?" she asked him.

"Uh, after we had attacked the Hoorg, you mean? Yes. That was me and my family," he answered.

"Wise... That was very wise," she commented directly to him, "Thank you for saving these people."

Rafeltu was not used to being complimented in such a manner, especially by a young woman. He gave her quiet a nod in appreciation. Mostly he had received unspoken appreciation in the form of absolute trust at his having saved the others.

Most of them had held on to the pain of the attack over the years and expressing their thanks wasn't fitting. It was something he simply understood.

"How did you make it alone?" one of the women asked.

"By the hand of Uverbim... and him." she answered, pointing to Bajesh.

Bajesh shifted nervously as the eyes of the entire tribe rested on him.

"There are no others?" Taysha asked, looking around at the few people around her. There was silence for a while as each person looked at each other, the fire, or the unseen dirt on their laps.

"There are no others," answered an old woman. She seemed to be the only elder in the tribe. She was grey-haired but her eyes shone like those of a new adult and it was obvious to Taysha that her mind was as quick as she was wise. Taysha recognized her as Daeruma, Rafeltu's mother. Like the other women in the group, she had once come to give advice in Taysha's hut during her Coming of Age.

"Are there no elders but yourself?" Taysha asked quietly, not really wanting to know the answer.

"No," replied several voices at once.

"Killed. Or raped and taken," said one.

"Raped? An old woman?" Taysha said in belief, only to have her disgust confirmed by several heads nodding, "Who were these animals?" she whispered, looking down at her feet.

"It looked as though there were at least three tribes," Rafeltu answered immediately. It was obvious he had had this discussion before, if not just practiced in his mind, "The Hoorg and two others. Each had their own distinct patterns on their clothes, on shields and such. I think there were more of them together than there were people in all our whole tribe."

"They should pay for what they have done," an infuriated Taysha shook in anger.

Her suggestion of vengeance was met with quiet stares.

"We're just happy you are here," her aunt broke the silence and stroked Taysha's hair, "And look at you – you're bigger than Rafeltu."

Rafeltu only nodded at the comment.

They were all quite beyond trying to hide noticing her obvious physical strength and her aunt traced the scars on her arm with her finger.

"She is warrior. Great warrior," Bajesh added in Osfer.

"A warrior?" repeated her aunt and looked at her again.

Taysha was feeling confined and tried to disperse some of the attention to her friends.

"This is Bajesh. He is my lover and the father of my daughters."

"You have daughters!?" a chorus broke out. Her plans to share the attention had backfired.

"Where are they?"

"You must bring them here."

"What are their names?"

These were but a few of the questions Taysha answered until she could direct the conversation back to how the small group of survivors had escaped.

Rafeltu's mother recited the names of those who had been with them from the first day of the Hoorg attack. There was now only twenty-two members from the original thirty-two they had started with. This included the five newborns during the travels. Taysha quickly deduced they had lost fifteen people in their travels. Some had died from the injuries they sustained during the attack while others from injuries or sickness during their five winters of roaming the valleys. Two of the women had taken their own lives and one child had gone missing altogether. The most anyone would say was that he either fell out of sight somewhere or was taken by wolves. Most of the children had died from sickness during the winters. It was without doubt the most terrible burden the survivors had to carry with them. Over the six years they had lost nine children that originally survived the Hoorg attack, and the pain lingered in their eyes.

Falotra, the only other surviving man, and his wife Forana, had been lovers during the time of the attack. It was a secret rendezvous near Rafeltu's family's hut that had saved them.

Vlosha told how Gelvloa had saved her by telling her before the attack to come to their new hut if anything bad happened. A Hoorg man who had grabbed her in the village suddenly changed his mind and grabbed her older sister.

The guilt of her sibling's sacrifice was a feeling Taysha could relate to. Potrana, only 5 Winters at the time, and her little sister of 3 Winters had run in the brambles to hide when she saw Vlosha escaping into the woods. All the yelling and screaming in the village convinced her to follow after her.

Thus Gelvloa alone indirectly saved three lives.

Of the children born on their travels, two were fathered by Falotra, both with Forana. The remaining three were fathered by Rafeltu. One was with his wife, Ufrudroia, and two more with two of the other women. It was quickly made apparent that topic was not open to conversation and Taysha let it slide as there were other things more important to learn first.

Rafeltu's wife, Ufrudroia had been pregnant during the Hoorg attack and gave birth to their third son shortly after. So, though Yashum was born after the event, all considered him a survivor like the others who made it out alive.

Still, Taysha commented about their low birthrate. It was understandable, considering there were only two men and the eldest boy was only 11 Winters. Some people replied that the constant moving kept the birthrate low. Vlosha made a joke about how she was waiting for Utol to come of Age, which sent a ripple of uncomfortable laughter among them. It seemed most of them were thinking the same thing.

The survivors now lived in a small camp of five huts. The twenty-two members were distributed among four huts with one reserved for winter stores and food. Taysha looked around at the huts as they explained this. They weren't much bigger than her own. The idea of constantly living with five or six people made her sad. That was until she realized her own family was five members strong.

Vlosha mentioned that with the arrival of Taysha, their tribe had now grown by three.

That comment brought Taysha to the reality of her situation. She couldn't just leave her home and join a small group of people whose strategy for survival was to run away if contacted. Taysha knew she would have to integrate the two tribes somehow. At least, they should share the same valley.

"We should bring you to the other side of the mountain and introduce you to the Wedic," she suggested.

A hush fell over the women and Taysha noticed they were waiting for a decision from the two men. Mostly Rafeltu.

But instead of asking everyone their opinion, he only stood there with his arms crossed as he looked at the ground, making the odd "Hmmm" to indicate he was thinking and not sleeping.

" _Have they completely given everything to him?_ " Taysha thought as she looked around at everyone silently waiting, " _He's like a chief._ "

The undertone of irony in her thoughts caught her unaware. After all her complaining about the Wedic constantly debating issues, she now sat there complaining about what she desired most. A chief.

After quiet consideration, Rafeltu spoke for the benefit of all to hear, "I will send Falotra. He can go and meet with these people. From that meeting we will see what the next step is."

Then he directed his question to Taysha, "You can guarantee his safety?" His attention was caught by a small snigger from Bajesh, who suddenly realized his bad manners. His mind scrambled to explain himself in their language.

"Uh, I laughing. Why? She strong. Taysha most ... all tribe ... hahah." Then realizing he didn't know enough of their language to explain, he hung his head and talked to Taysha in Wedic.

"Tell them you're the strongest in our tribe anyway. He's pretty safe, I'd think. Sorry, I laughed. Tell them I'm sorry I laughed."

Wayu smiled and nodded in agreement and pointed to Taysha as she reluctantly translated.

Much to Bajesh's apparent relief, the group wowed and wooed, and most importantly, laughed.

"I'm not really the strongest. He's just having fun. But, yes, I can guarantee his safety at the Wedic tribe," she explained to relieve them of any unspoken fears.

"Can I go with you?" asked her old friend Vlosha.

Taysha hesitated as she looked at the plump young woman, considering the hardship of the journey and mostly the thought of how Bahnu would react when she saw Taysha arrive with a girl tagging behind.

That is, she considered these things until Rafeltu abruptly answered.

"No. Not this time."

Taysha had not been used to having her questions answered for her for quite some time but she didn't want a fight. Still, she also knew she wanted to establish her position independent of being one of Rafeltu's women.

"Uh, I don't mean to be disrespectful," Taysha said, "but, I..." here she tapped her fingers on her bowl of tea and chose her words carefully, "I want to say from the start that I am free from this leadership for now. Vlosha is my friend and the decision should be made between us."

Taysha's aunt went to speak but Rafeltu spoke first.

"Taysha, I also don't mean disrespect," he explained, "but we have had a very long and costly journey. Just as you have. We will find our new order and positions in time. Until then, there is no fear to speak your mind. I completely understand. Remember, I was the one who spoke my mind after we attacked the Hoorg, and I was ostracized. That won't happen to you. You're home now. However you want to make it."

Taysha looked at him quietly.

" _He is a wise man,_ " she thought as she nodded in reply, " _That's good. Good for us all._ "

Rafeltu turned to Vlosha, "It seems I have, once again, spoken too soon. I would agree with Taysha. It's your decision, if she says you're welcome."

"I would really like to go..." she half-pleaded to Taysha.

After all she had said, Taysha started feeling foolish, and a smile of embarrassment crossed her lips before the words left her mouth. She let out a nervous little laugh.

"It is a tough climb, Vlo. We'll need to get back to the village quickly before they start looking for us. So, it's probably best you don't come this time. Sorry."

Vlosha hung her head in disappointment. Taysha was so happy to see her friend back and alive with her but saddened to see they were so different now.

Rafeltu nodded in confirmation and turned back to Taysha, "I'm hoping you and your friends will not leave right away but spend a couple days with us to celebrate your return."

Taysha turned and translated to the other two in Wedic, much to the commotion of her tribe-folk who were impressed with her ability to speak another language.

"What's one more day?" shrugged Bajesh.

"Well, this calls for something a little stronger than tea," Rafeltu stated upon hearing the decision.

A tap on Gelvloa's shoulder sent her off to the store-hut with a couple of the other women.

When the berry wine was handed around, Taysha noticed everyone was holding their cups and waiting for something. When Rafeltu had his cup filled last, he held it out and toasted, "To the gods."

He spilled a modest drop to the ground in the gods honour. Those around the fire did likewise, including Wayu and Bajesh. But there was something about it that hit Taysha in the chest and she sat unmoving. A silence enveloped as everyone noticed Taysha's reaction as they took their first mouthful of wine. Before anyone could finish swallowing and talk, Taysha held up her cup and repeated sarcastically, "To the gods..."

The smiles that followed quickly disappeared as Taysha spat on the ground.

"I don't drink to the gods," she added sternly. She could hear Bajesh swallow and exhale, as if he had been expecting something like this from the beginning.

"Why ever not?" Rafeltu's wife, asked with distain.

"They are mischievous and not trustworthy," Taysha answered simply.

In the moment of uncomfortable silence, Rafeltu spoke.

"And to whom do you drink to, Taysha?"

The gentle tone of his question humbled her and she found herself thankful for his wisdom.

"I drink to Uverbim... or Uverta. The Goddesses," she answered without the strength to look at him directly.

Rafeltu once again raised his cup, and solemnly and boldly toasted once more, "To the Goddesses."

Taysha noticed the others followed along quite easily.

Although she had broken the original merriment, it was an important moment in their new relationship. It was clear they would have to think about what they said to her from then on.

There would be no flippant remarks or the usual berating that was done by the older ones of the tribe to those younger.

Not to her, in any case.

Taysha felt the reassuring touch of her aunt's hand as she rubbed it up and down her back. Taysha looked over to see her aunt smiling and give her niece a wink. All was good. The good mood quickly resumed as the taste of the wine was complimented by all. Wayu and Bajesh found it much sweeter than the Wedic wine. Taysha explained it was sweetened with honey when they could find it. The simplicity of the idea made the two wonder why the Wedic hadn't thought of doing that.

Taysha tried to relax with the others, but it was obvious she would once again have to learn the customs of a tribe.

The night consisted mostly of Taysha telling her story, from her mother's defence of her and how she got away. She told them of the first wolf that had followed her for days only to disappear without a trace. Some said the wolf was sent from the gods to protect her. From what she remembered it didn't look like much of a fighter. More like a thief, stealing her monthly collective in the middle of the night.

She went on to tell of the strange mushroom adventure and the point when she thought her spirit was beginning its preparations to depart this world. She told of her first arrival at the Wedic tribe and the help from Bajesh and his family. She down-played the bad reception she first received as she didn't want anyone to worry about going to meet her adopted people. She told them her original plan was to heal and then go to the Great Water when the attack from the wolf that she now wore guided her to a new path. Bajesh reminded her of the bear and she told him not to get ahead of the story.

She told of her wolf cubs who were both now her friends and defenders. This part of the story greatly intrigued the children and they were already looking forward to meeting Wada and Ushi. The fact that she had tamed wolves was the biggest impression yet and a lot of the older women were already showing a mixture of awe and concern.

Taysha led them through the details of the one-day war with the Kubu that ended with the annihilation of their forces and the death of Bajesh's father. She talked about the Wedic and the difference in customs. Their spicy foods and supply of geese, the animals that looked like fluffy goats that they called _sheep_ , and especially the eggs. She described the differences in the structures of their huts and their system of counting weeks in each month and adding a day of relaxation after every circuit. She used Bajesh and Wayu's cloths as example of their weaving skills, dyes, and design.

Vlosha was more mesmerized by Taysha's hair and sat stroking it through most of her stories. It wasn't greasy or matted like her Amazoi brethren. Taysha explained it was a type of soap that one could use without water. Vlosha was very happy to be promised she would teach her the recipe.

Eventually, the memories began to flood Taysha's emotions and the tears started falling once again. Bajesh, quite able to imagine the possible story behind the tears, filled in by adding the praises for Taysha that she had deliberately left out.

He did his best to tell them of her fights with Adit and her valour on the battlefield where she, along with Wayu and a handful of others, remained unscathed. Explaining how she had stood up to the Kubu and yelled at them and their armed men took a little help from Taysha, but the story was told. And he told them she showed him how to bathe in Amazoi fashion.

Bajesh's gallant attempt to tell the stories of her life was enough to distract Taysha from crying. She wiped her nose on her wolf arm again and looked up.

"Do you still bathe together?" Taysha asked everyone.

"Of course. Why wouldn't we?"

"When we can," Rafeltu added, hinting at the troubles they'd had because of constantly having to move.

Taysha just smiled.

It was good to be back among her own people.

\- - - - -
That night Wayu was given a place to sleep with Falotra's family while Taysha and Bajesh slept with Rafeltu and his. Although a bit crowded, it seemed the logical place to stay as they had much to discuss as leaders. It was a new and unknown path that now lay before the Amazoi. The first thing Rafeltu wanted to go over was the proper etiquette of this new tribe along with a brief history, language, and beliefs to help Falotra from doing something that would be common to the Amazoi but insulting to the Wedic. Rafeltu started by asking what a proper greeting was after sharing that awkward meeting with Bajesh and Wayu. Bajesh laughed and nodded when he heard the Amazoi grabbed each other's forearms, not hands.

Rafeltu told them he was one of the members from the hunting party they had discovered. As Taysha guessed, they were originally just scouting around for future locations if the need arose to run again. Taysha complimented him on bringing the women with him. His relaxed comment of not having any choice bothered her a bit though. He seemed surprised to hear it would take so long to get over the mountain and back.

"Well, there's actually two mountains," stated Taysha, "We go over the one behind us and then around the other. That pass is about two days' run or three nights' walk."

"Two days run!" Ufrudroia exclaimed with a disapproving shake of her head.

Ufrudroia hadn't spoken much since Taysha arrived but it seemed there was nothing positive about anything she did say. The annoying feeling reminded Taysha to change the subject back to something that had been bothering her.

"Why are there so few children?" she asked.

The question was met with silence from Rafeltu and his family as his wife started to collect empty bowls. Rafeltu was thoughtful in readying his answer. More precisely, he was becoming more careful in his answer.

"Well, that, uh, there's only two men of Age now. My son will be soon. Perhaps this summer." They looked over at Utol who sat looking uncomfortable with the attention.

"What about you and, sorry, what was your name again?" Taysha enquired to Rafeltu while pointing to his wife.

"Ufru-droia," she replied coldly.

It was clear the two were not going to get along.

Taysha pronounced her name to Bajesh and translated, "Ufru-droia. Shy deer. A female deer. Deer is 'droi' but..."

Taysha's explanation in Wedic was interrupted by Ufrudroia. "I don't see how us having children or not is any of your concern."

"Ufru!" Rafeltu rebuked her instantly but Taysha caught Ufrudroia's subtle shrug that clearly stated she had done nothing wrong.

"What does that mean?" Taysha questioned without hesitance.

The short silence was broken by Rafeltu, "I fathered a child last year. With one of the others," he said quickly and sat looking at Taysha as though he was confessing to a murder.

"Another one," muttered Ufrudroia under her breath as she busied herself with the cleaning up.

At first Taysha wanted to laugh out loud at the way Rafeltu was reacting, but she figured she would focus on picking a fight with Ufrudroia before starting to annoy anyone else.

She leaned back and looked around at the family.

"That's a good thing," she prodded, while honestly wondering where the problem was.

"Hardly," gasped his wife.

"What?" Taysha focused her gaze to the woman.

"You think a husband fathering other children's ... other women's children is a good thing?" Ufrudroia stammered at Taysha in a harsh tone. Taysha knew better than to follow that type of question and she closed her mouth to think. She felt a surge of content feelings as she could finally argue in her own language,

"How old are you?" she asked the woman.

"What? What does that have to..."

Taysha cut her short and called out louder, "How old are you, woman!"

"I ... I have 32 Winters behind me, girl. And I don't thi..."

The way she emphasised the word "girl" showed she figured herself Taysha's superior, a viewpoint Taysha did not share. Ufrudroia's words were cut off as Taysha rose up on one knee and snarled across to her.

"You ... dare ... talk to me like that? You maggot."

Ufrudroia's mouth clamped shut.

She looked at her husband for support but he was too shocked to do anything. He just sat staring open-mouthed at the rising barbarian who was once a quiet Amazoi girl.

"If you ever show underhanded or straightforward disrespect to me, _woman_ ," Taysha warned with pointed finger, "I will drag you out by the hair and beat you before the whole tribe."

"Rafeltu?" the woman prompted her husband to respond.

"Taysha!" he yelled abruptly at her.

She had expected that and she kept her gaze firmly on the woman. She would not so easily be swayed by the tactics of a weak-woman. The fight was between her and Taysha first. Still, she did feel a surge of the same fear she felt when her father was mad at her as a child. But she reminded herself those days were far behind her and she turned slowly to Rafeltu.

"Make no mistake, and hear me well. I have killed wolves and bears and _men_. If you attempt to scold me like a child, I will meet you outside and we will fight. And there will be one less useless man among us."

Taysha saw he was taken aback by the threat. She hadn't meant to say it that way. In fact, she regretted saying it as soon as it slipped out. She bit her bottom lip and quickly tried to fix it as she continued, "You sit here and squirm in the discomfort of this woman's jealousy? Are you mad?"

Rafeltu was now speechless. The combined image of her fighting him and the sudden assault of insults was making his thoughts form slower than she talked. He had experienced much in his lifetime but nothing had prepared him for this.

"I have just passed my 20th Winter and I have two daughters. Daughters I tried _not_ to have. Only because I thought I was alone and soon would die. But you!" she pointed back and forth between the two of them, "You have twenty-something people. Most of the women are of Age." She directed her finger to young Gelvloa who was clearly child-bearing age, "The only people left of our tribe ... our language, our culture, our history ... and you fret over doing what is right and natural?"

She focused her anger back on Ufrudroia, "Every woman of Age should be pregnant or have small children by now. Stupid! Stupid, stupid, stupid."

She sat back down and in the immediate silence tried to sum up her point.

"It's not a matter of who he sticks his cock into – it's about the survival of our people."

Though not at the particular moment he would have preferred, Rafeltu finally found his tongue.

"That's why we've been moving constantly, Taysha... and why we don't take time to get everyone pregnant. And as you said, this is about preserving our way of life. One of these is the hallowed charge of marriage."

"The hallowed cha..?" her own scornful laugh stopped her from repeating the words, "That's just... It's a ... a... curse it, I'm forgetting my own language. It's when you have a surplus of things. Something that's not needed but nice to have," she explained, hoping one of them would be kind enough to aid her in her argument.

"A Luxury," helped out Gelvloa, ignoring the looks from her parents.

"A luxury. Thank you. That's exactly what it is. When there are so few men and women, we can't afford to waste..." She looked down into the fire. The sound of her own voice had suddenly become intolerable and she sat back in silence and folded her arms across her chest.

"What was that about?" asked Bajesh.

"Uh, she all upset because he father of child from another girl. I told them it's not time for worry about such shit and piss."

The family sat listening to her jabber away in Wedic while she pointed to each of them during the story.

"Well, you know, Taysha..." Bajesh started to say, but stopped when he saw her look and snarled lip.

It made Taysha's authority evident to Rafeltu and he leaned forward a bit to indicate wanting to speak.

"Maybe it best you sleep outside tonight. Regardless of being right or wrong, it's bad manners to speak to your elders that way," he said.

Taysha looked around the hut. She met eyes with Gelvloa. The girl looked saddened by the outcome and a little afraid.

Taysha checked her bowl to find it empty of mint tea.

"I'm sorry to have caused trouble on my first day. And I apologize for _some_ of my ... my ill-chosen wording. But I believe I'm right. This is a new time for our people. But before all these small details can be worked on we need to..."

"Small details?" half-whispered Ufrudroia, then raised her voice as she continued, "We've been doing fine without you so far, _Taysha._ "

Taysha stopped and looked at her elder as she sat defiantly looking back. Taysha's heart started to race as her options and the possible scenarios at the end of each choice flashed through her head. One foot wanted to step outside and the other wanted to rest itself firmly on Ufrudroia's face.

Taysha had warned her. But was it in her rights to beat her? Either way she had to decide quickly.

" _If I ever spoke to my father that way, or to Anami or Adit or most of the men of either tribe, those who could beat me would beat me. And beat me hard."_ she thought to herself.

Her decision made, she stood abruptly and stepped quickly over Rafeltu's crossed legs towards the woman and made a grab for her tunic. The seated woman yelled and made an attempt to deflect Taysha's hand and defend herself by stretching out and grabbing Taysha's hair. Taysha had no experience in hair-pulling fights and the force of the seated woman pulling her down caught her off guard. With the sudden added feeling of either Bajesh or Rafeltu pulling on her right arm, she panicked.

She pulled back with her left arm and swung a clenched fist, quickly and solidly, into the cheek of Ufrudroia. Rafeltu sat helplessly holding Taysha's other arm. The married couple both sat wide eyed at the understanding of what Taysha had actually done. Before they could react, Taysha's second strike landed.

This time her knuckles hit Ufrudroia square on the nose. It seemed to have little effect on the woman as she sat in shock. Taysha was starting to get worried about how severe a beating would become necessary to break her.

Bajesh intervened by grabbing Taysha's left arm, stopping her from hitting the woman a third time.

Ufrudroia held her bleeding nose with one hand while still holding onto Taysha's hair with the other.

Quickly adapting to this new type of warfare, Taysha kicked her toes into the woman's ribs. Ufrudroia released her grip and let out a gasp of air in pain as she tried to catch her breath by pulling both her arms to her stomach. Both the youngest children started to scream and Rafeltu sprang to his knees, grabbing Taysha around the arms, pinning them to her waist. He pulled up and back, tripping over Bajesh and crashing a small hole in the side of their hut. But he kept hanging on, trying to throw this wild woman back out of reach of his wife. The children cried for their mother as Taysha yelled insults and Rafeltu pushed and manoeuvred her outside.

"You will have to leave this hut sometime, Woman! And when you do, you will face me! You will bow to me .... with your shit-mouth in the dirt. You will apologize or you will fight me!"

"Ge ... get out of my hut," Ufrudroia gasped defiantly.

"Maggot! Pig fucker! I will whip you into submission!" Taysha roared.

The two men, with a lot of struggling, managed to get her out of the hut. Rafeltu stood at the doorway shouting for her to leave as he got Gelvloa to pass out their belongings.

Bajesh still stood with his arm around her waist.

Breathing heavily, but not struggling, Taysha turned to him, "Let go of me." she hissed quietly, "Let go or we fight."

He let her go knowing he most likely wouldn't be able to stop her and especially knowing what she was capable of doing to him if he didn't. Having been released, she stood calmly re-arranging her tunic and hair.

"Go?" she said in between breaths, "Go where?"

Before Rafeltu could answer she continued, "I am home now, Rafeltu. Your people are weak. Weak! And they are afraid and few in number. If Falotra doesn't come with me tomorrow, we will be back with the warriors of the Wedic tribe. And we will make you our weak, useless slaves."

She spat on the ground in disgust.

"Better I do it than someone like the Hoorg."

There was a moment of unspoken connection between her and Rafeltu as they stood there looking at each other.

She had spoken the unspeakable truth.

Better her do it, than someone like the Hoorg.

Taysha was right.

His group had been fortunate enough for the last seven winters, but there was always still a risk of the last two Amazoi men being killed and the rest taken as slaves.

From inside the hut, Ufrudroia was screaming orders at her kids to get Taysha's things out of her hut. Gelvloa's sullen face stuck out of the deer-skin door as she handed up their bows to her father. Gelvloa's eyes connected with Taysha and they seemed to be apologizing on behalf of her mother.

Taysha stepped over to gather her things and repeated in an uncomfortable whisper to Rafeltu, "It would be better if I kill you all myself than leave the women to be raped and owned by another tribe."

He did not so quickly dismiss the possibility she might just do that. And it sent a chill down Rafeltu's spine. Had they come this far, only to be doomed by one of their own?

The Amusement of the Gods...

Wayu, who had surmised it was time to leave, joined them with all his things.

"We'll be back in the morning," Taysha finished in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear.

"We'll either meet Falotra ready to leave or we'll meet a rain of arrows. Either way. We'll be prepared."

She noticed Falotra standing solemnly looking back at her with his arms folded. If there was anyone to fear in this village, it was him. She made a mental note that the Amazoi had the straight bows, similar to the ones the Wedic had first used. Taysha's side had the bows taken from the Kubu tribe. If it came to a fight, they would have no problem beating Rafeltu and Falotra alone. She hadn't come this far to be sent away from the village like a bad dog. She was ready to kill Rafeltu first, then his wife. If Falotra stood up next, then it would be his turn. From there, she would have to see who else opposed her.

She pulled her wolf skin over her head and started walking away.

Inside the hut, the children were still crying as Gelvloa tried to console their mother. Ufrudroia suddenly pushed off her clinging children and stood up. She wiped the blood from her chin, grabbed a hunting knife and ran past her husband.

"Father! Stop her. She's got a knife!" Gelvloa called out.

Rafeltu had been facing the others, telling them to go back to their huts. Before he could turn and grab Ufrudroia, she was beyond his grasp.

"How dare you! You little maggot!" she screamed as she ran at Taysha.

Taysha turned and saw the knife glint in the moonlight. She also noticed the way it was held. Ufrudroia had it clenched in her fist with the blade facing backwards.

" _A good way to stab yourself in the leg,_ " Taysha thought instinctively. She also noted there was one most-probable way it could be used – a thrust in a downward motion from above her head. That meant Taysha had two chances to get the weapon out of the woman's hands. One chance to grab it when she lifted it in the air and one on the way down.

Taysha tossed her shield to one side and her bow and javelin at Bajesh's chest on the other. Mostly, she did it to keep him busy so he wouldn't try to hinder her and get her hurt or killed in the process. Wayu backed off right away.

Taysha moved towards Ufrudroia in long steady strides. Ufrudroia was in such a state of fury, she neither stopped nor hesitated as Taysha had expected she would. The fierceness of the woman impressed her and she hoped Ufrudroia didn't actually kill her.

Taysha also noticed Rafeltu in close pursuit.

He would be upon them by the time she attempted to disarm the woman. When he did, he would make a mess of things. Three bodies and a loose knife was not a story with a happy ending. But there was little else to do now that she was committed. The sudden question of whether Ufrudroia was skilled enough to move the knife in a slashing motion for her throat made Taysha skip a step.

' _Underestimating your enemy, is his best weapon against you._ '

Thankfully, Ufrudroia showed her inexperience by raising the knife long before Taysha was close enough to grab it. The disarming would have to happen on the down stroke. She kept her eye on the charging woman's shoulder for tell-tale signs of tightening muscles committing her to the strike. When they were an arm's length away, the attack was released in a predictable yet sturdy slice down towards her. Taysha's only thought was anger at the woman for trying to cut her face.

In the blink of an eye, Taysha used her forward momentum to jump to her attacker's right side.

The downward blade met no resistance as it cut through the air where Taysha once stood. The motion was now being guided by Taysha's hand that rested gently on top of Ufrudroia's upper arm.

Taysha was planning to take the arm and use it to throw Ufrudroia's whole body at her husband's knees, killing two birds with one arrow. But the woman's inexperience in hand-to-hand combat worked to her benefit. She stumbled awkwardly forward out of Taysha's grasp and landed almost on Wayu's feet.

Taysha noticed she had let go of the knife when she had thrust out her hands to stop from landing on her face. Not worried about the threat of being cut, Taysha now found herself in the path of a larger, heavier problem.

Rafeltu.

Her experience instantly told her that his speed and weight would be too much for a grab and throw, so she quickly dropped to the ground and curled up into a ball. Rafeltu hit her with his shins running at full speed, sending him flying over her and landing almost on top of Ufrudroia. His knee had caught Taysha on the ribs, but the pain was nothing next to the exhilaration of standing above her two fallen enemies.

Taysha couldn't help but smile. She finally got to use _The Turtle_ that Anami had taught her years ago.

She stepped over calmly and picked up the knife. Most of the tribe had run after Rafeltu and knowing they now stood behind her, she did a quick check to see if Falotra was about to test his arm on her as well. But he stood at the side, looking back at her sternly yet silently.

Taysha turned back to her attacker and made a show of gently throwing the knife so it landed beside Ufrudroia. She then took a few steps to the side so she wouldn't be caught between Rafeltu and Falotra.

"Try again!" she challenged loudly for all to hear.

Ufrudroia was startled to see Taysha toss the knife at her but she soon recovered her anger. She reached out and took it.

"Ufru!" cried out her husband still lying on the ground beside her. His eyes spoke of caution.

"Don't worry, Man," Taysha teased, "I won't kill her."

Ufrudroia hesitated as she sat squeezing the knife handle.

"What's the matter?" Taysha baited, "Do you only _now_ realise who you face? Do you _now_ realise who I am?"

Ufru didn't move as the blood dripped from her nose. The pain from the hard landing was clearing her head quickly.

"More importantly," Taysha added turning a bit so those behind her could hear, "do you now see how weak you are?" Then pointing to Ufrudroia she yelled, "Had you used _half_ the spirit against the one who bore your husband's child, you would be worthy to be leader! But you didn't, did you? You sulked and chirped like a bird safely from your tree... And because of it, you lost the respect of these people and the respect of yourself."

Taysha envisioned Adit praising her for using mental tactics so well. She had just allied herself with her attacker by making the two women who bore her husband's children their common enemy.

Ufrudroia tried to reply but her mouth found no words. This strange young woman seemed so much larger than when she first sat in her hut.

"You are keeping our people small and weak," Taysha said, pointing to the two of them as she walked out of Ufrudroia's range and took her weapons from Bajesh, "I respect your courage though ... You would make a fine warrior if properly trained."

The Amazoi quietly approached their leaders as Taysha walked away. Before she entered the forest, she stopped and called over so all could hear.

"You need to train! You need to be taught these skills that I have!... We will be back tomorrow, Falotra. Be ready."

Taysha turned quickly and led her men into the woods. She just wanted to get away before Falotra yelled back at her.

\- - - - -
Rafeltu sat up and stayed seated for quite a while.

Ufrudroia let the blood drip to the ground as she stood perfectly still with her side towards where Taysha had disappeared into the night.

She had a skinned knee and the palm of her right hand was scraped. Rafeltu's mother took the knife from her hand and helped to lead her back to their hut.

The remaining Amazoi held council by the fire that night. Rather less than a council, they simply asked Rafeltu what was to be done. He sat nursing his sprained wrist, feeling the eyes of Taysha from the dark forest beyond them.

"I think," he addressed his people, "I think that Taysha has had a very long and lonely journey. She has obviously experienced things that we have not. And there are most likely things she has gone through that she wouldn't share with us. Things seen or done that need not be mentioned. Regardless, she is our daughter who has returned to us, and we can do nothing more than see what the gods make of this. From now, as always, it is the will of the gods."

In the silence that followed, Rafeltu stood.

"Ar li-ra minar-to." he said to them all.

"As the gods wish." the small band of survivors repeated his phrase in unison.

Rafeltu stood holding his wrist as his eyes scanned the treeline. "We will do what we can for this daughter... this lost daughter of the Amazoi."

\- - - - -  
\- - - - -

NOTE ON ENGLISH TRANSLATION

In order to avoid publishing many smaller books with over-lapping stories, Book I is the combination of Prof. Orlov's manuscripts titled _The Habits and Customs of the Amazoi (pre-massacre)_ which included beliefs and history of the Amazoi, _The Story of the Great Taysha_ which follows the primary story of this book, and _The_ _Scroll of Wayu_ which primarily documented Wayu's telling of the events. Elements of _The Story of the Great Taysha_ continues on into Book II.

Viewpoints of most of the historical characters are written with a degree of creative license fitted together from various pieces of information (documentation of their personal thoughts, beliefs or feelings) which give insight to how they may have reacted.

Amazoi words that are not easily translated were written "as is" in the original scrolls (with explanation in Greek). These were kept as such by Orlov's Russian translation and thus continued to the final English version.

One example is the word "bird." In current English, the word in itself has little to no negative connotations. Yet in Osfer, the language of the Amazoi, it means someone who is chatty, silly, flighty, or a woman or man who sleeps with more partners beyond the social norm (i.e., a bird that hops from branch to branch).

The Amazoi language gives titles where we in English do not. For example "Winters" is the title in reference to _one year survived_. This adds considerably deeper meaning than its English equivalent and is therefore kept as is. Names of places which are simple translations, such as the _Children's Camp_ or the _Training Grounds_ are considered names of importance in Osfer and thus capitalization is kept out of a sense of respect.

Military words are translated to more modernized terminology when possible (e.g., cavalry, lieutenants, flanks). Other phrases that have no equivalent translation are translated word-for-word (e.g., War Groups, Spear Wielder, Left Shield Bearer.)

Places or events that were named by the Amazoi, though losing much of their effect in the literal English translation, have not been changed to appear friendlier to English ears. Descriptions such as _The Great Water_ or _The Last Ambush_ may not hold the impact in English that they had in their native tongue; none the less, these were the words chosen by those people and are kept as is in the hope it brings to light the character of those who used them.

Phrases of the Osfer language had originally been translated directly into Greek and copied verbatim by Prof. Orlov.

At certain times liberties have been taken for the sake of clarity for the reader. Otherwise, Osfer phrases and expressions such as _Don't be a tree_ (Don't let people walk over you) are accompanied by an explanation within the flow of the story. Those with meanings that can be logically derived are left as is, although perhaps awkward sounding.

Detailed Information on the Amazoi culture, Osfer language, historic references, maps, character timelines, full list of characters, images and further reading, can be found at:

www.TheAmazonChronicle.com

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