Perhaps All Colours

"So you really think he's the one?" Shanka asked.

Old Master nodded. "So the Voice tells me."

"You hear voices?"

"Just one. I see him, too. He told me I'd find you. When we're done with Rastaban, the Voice will tell us where the next one waits." Old Master shrugged.

"What does this 'voice' look like?"

"A man. With hair of moonlight and eyes of newly-broken dawn--"

Impossible. Shanka's hand went to the hilt of her sword.

But Old Master grinned and continued. "Or ordinary, human brown. His eyes have no colour at all, or perhaps are all colours."

(AN: confused about the Voice? Check the tags for "interlude" and maybe check the posts on either side of the interludes. Yay for back-dating entries.)

Who Do You Think?

“Sir, we found the guards. They’re unconscious but mostly unharmed,” Rhajj began.

Rastaban curled his hands into fists. A roar of fury coiled behind his breastbone, but he refused to give into his emotions. He had to keep his head clear, if only long enough to find Shanka and put her head on a pole.

“Wake the men and circle the camp with fresh guards. Send scouts to follow Shanka’s army north toward the steppes.”

“Shanka’s army?” Khouri echoed.

“Who do you think knocked out our guards, idiot? Go!”

Khouri snapped off a salute and ducked out of the tent.

No Man Yet

Malia and Shanka stood on a hill above Rastaban’s camp and watched the soldiers scurry about, panicked at finding their guards and scouts unconscious in a heap on the south side of the valley.

“We could crush them in a single battle,” Malia said.

“We’re being patient right now,” Shanka said.

“What’s your plan? Or is it his plan?” Neither Malia nor any of the other soldiers asked about one man - old, greying, too spry to be real - who travelled with the troops.

“My plan is amusement,” Shanka said, “and evaluation.”

“No man is worthy of you.”

“No man yet.”

Bested

Rastaban watched her walk away and felt furious with himself. He couldn’t remember the last time he had felt so helpless, either. He watched the line of soldiers he’d thought was his guards withdraw, and then he spun away, dashed back into camp.

“General,” Khouri said. “Where were you? The scouts said --”

“Get men around the perimeter and make sure none of our guards are dead,” Rastaban said. “And send the scouts to me.”

Khouri nodded, darted a worried glance at Rhajj, but both of them bowed and hurried to obey.

Rastaban wasn’t going to be bested by a woman.

Two of a Very Special Kind

Rastaban took a step back. “How do you know that?”

“My scouts are very good at what they do,” Shanka said. It was an implication, but not a real answer.

Rastaban studied her face, her dark skin and her uncanny golden eyes. He’d seen her before, he was sure of it - and not just on the steppes.

“Who are you?” Rastaban curled his hands into fists, felt his fingertips trace the sign against evil against his thigh.

Shanka stepped back, sheathed her knife, and tipped down her helm. “I’m two of a very special kind. For now. Keep your terms.”

Learned Them From You

Rastaban’s brow furrowed. “Pardon?”

Again with that velvet-soft laughter. “You didn’t realize it because you were a child, had never left your village, but --” She leaned in to whisper, so close her breath stirred his hair. “All those rumours you learned about the army of women - you didn’t hear them from your men. Your men learned them from you.” She stepped back, smirking, and Rastaban knew he must look utterly shocked. “After all, your mother taught you to respect the women who defended your nation.”

“My mother is dead,” Rastaban said flatly.

“Killed by the man you called father.”

Part Of It

“I understand your offer,” he said curtly, and moved to step back. Shanka let him, but she didn’t sheathe her knife.

“And your terms?”

“What are yours?” Rastaban asked.

“We will let you live if you stop warring on our nation.” Shanka kept her chin up, and her golden eyes glinted in the dying firelight.

Something in Rastaban stirred. She wasn’t - quite canny.

“What, precisely, is your nation?”

“You know it well,” Shanka said. “Your men have raided it for the past twenty years.” She tilted her head to one side. “But then, long ago, you were part of it.”

Even A Man

Rastaban cast a wild glance at the figures on the perimeters of the camp and saw them standing tall, bearing torches, armed - only they stood perfectly still, and they wore armor he didn’t recognize. Fury and helplessness curled in his veins. Had she killed more of his men?

“Terms, General.” The blade at his throat pressed down harder.

“And if I refuse to give any?”

“Then you and half of your army will be dead before the other half can wake.”

Rastaban stared down at that pretty face and marveled at her words. She was crueler than even a man.

Seeking Terms

Rastaban let his hand fall to his side and swallowed hard. “Of course. Forgive me. Your offer?”

“I come seeking terms,” she said. She kept the knife at his throat.

Rastaban’s eyes narrowed, and he glared down at her. Terms - no one had ever dared ask terms of him before. “You do?”

“I do. Tell me the terms of your surrender, and I will tell my women to leave your camp and return to the Steppes peacefully.”

Rastaban arched one eyebrow. “Your women are here?”

Shanka’s laughter was soft, like velvet. “Did you think those were your guards out there?”

A General First

“I thought,” Shanka said, “that it would be courteous, one general to another, to come speak to your directly about what I have to offer.”

Rastaban smiled. “I’m sure that whatever you have to offer is generous and enticing indeed.”

Her smile in reply was sultry, and Rastaban went to ease an arm around her waist. She was just as easily charmed as any other woman, then.

Except she had the blade of a dagger pressed to his throat before he could lay a hand on her. Her smile remained sultry, and she said,

“I am a general first, Rastaban.”

Any Other Woman

For one moment, Rastaban was struck by how beautiful Shanka was in the moonlight, the way a silvery halo glowed in her hair, and her smile was - gentle.

Rastaban’s grip on the hilt of his sword loosened, and he came to stand before her - over her, because she was small. He hadn’t realized how small she was, not with an army and dead men between them.

“You are bold,” he said, “to come this close to my camp.”

Shanka lifted her head and met his gaze, and if she were any other woman, he’d have leaned down for a kiss.

Starting Forward

Rastaban reached for his sword, ready to raise it above his head and call for his men, but her lips twitched into a different kind of smile, and she held up one finger, a universal signal for silence. And then she beckoned.

Rastaban hesitated. She was a general, more ruthless than any man he’d known, but she was still - a woman. And one thing Rastaban had learned, that Rami had never taught him, was how to master a woman. How to bend her completely to his will with just the right words, just the right touch.

So he started forward.

The General

Rastaban faltered, momentarily mesmerized by those eyes, eyes like a lynx’s or a long-toothed tiger’s, and then a figure rose up from the grass, soundless. She wore armor and carried a sword and her hair blew around her face in mystifying curls. Rastaban glanced over his shoulder, but his men were huddled around the central fires. Not one of them had seen her.

Rastaban realized he could see her face, that he recognized her, and realized that she’d made it past his outer perimeter of guards.

Her smile said she knew the very same thing.

She was the general.

Golden Eyes in the Grass

When Rastaban’s army was almost to their village in the valley, he called a halt. They’d taken inventory a few days ago, checked to see who’d died and who’d lost what in the scramble. Rastaban closed his eyes and took a deep breath, turned to face his men. He wasn’t sure how he would explain to the women that they’d lost a hundred of the outer rank and returned home without a single spoil to show for it.

And then he felt a tingling down his spine.

He spun, raised his spear, and poised to throw.

Golden eyes met his.

Open Season

Shanka sat in her tent, studying some of the maps she and Old Master had crafted over the years. Generous applications of animal oil had kept the things from fading, but it was probably time she made some new ones.

There was a rustling of fabric, and then Malia poked her head into the tent.

Shanka didn’t look up from the troop markers she’d set. “What news?”

“The bodies have been stripped and disposed. Armorers are working on upgrading and refitting the armor. Scouts are tracking Rastaban’s army.”

“Good.” Shanka smiled faintly. “Follow them. It’s open season on the men.”

Know What's Real

Rastaban and his men reached the halfway point between the borders of their own land and the first grasses of the steppes, and guards formed a nervous line around the camp that night. Rhajj, Khouri, and Rastaban gathered in Rastaban’s tent to confer by candle light.

“What the hell was that?” Khouri asked. “They just slaughtered our men.”

Rastaban considered the core of the candle. “If I had been her, I would have done the same.”

Rhajj cleared his throat nervously. “We all heard the tales,” he began.

“Tales do not matter,” Rastaban said. “We need to know what’s real.”

If You Say So

Shanka watched Rastaban and the men flee, then glanced at Malia, her lieutenant.

Malia snorted and tipped her helm back down, signalled for the women to begin moving the corpses, search them for useful weapons and armor.

“That was disappointing,” she said. “After all we’d heard about the grand General Rastaban.”

“He’ll be back,” Shanka said. “Continue.” She turned away, tipped her helm back down and headed for the edges of the field. A soldier fell into step beside her, and a man’s voice spoke from behind the anonymous helm.

Old Master. “He’s the one.”

“If you say so, Master.”

Taking It

Unfortunately, some of Rastaban’s men knew little valour and much foolhardy bravery. The outer ranks charged the women. Rastaban yelled for them to halt, withdraw, and his lieutenants plunged into the ranks to haul some men backward, but it was too late. Shanka’s women reacted immediately and surged in on the men like a crushing wave, cutting them down as easily as men cut fields of barley.

Of the men who would listen to Rastaban, most were trying to run. In any other men it would have seemed cowardice, but now it was the only choice, and Rastaban took it.

Better Part

Rastaban must have hesitated too long, because one of the women caught his men by the hair and yanked his head back, ready to slit his throat.

Shanka barked a command, and for the moment Rastaban’s men were still alive. She met his gaze, yellow eyes bold, and for a fleeting moment Rastaban saw shadows in her eyes. Then she leveled her sword at him and said,

“Choose. Or die.”

Rastaban sucked in a deep breath. Of all he’d learnt from Rami, this was hardly something he’d prepared for. He knew that retreat was sometimes the better part of valour.

Speaking of Women

“Then let the culling begin.” Shanka tipped her helm back down and signaled to her soldiers. The ranks of women advanced, weapons poised to kill.

Rastaban felt a thousand gazes on him, terrified but too proud to plead. “Wait!”

Shanka twitched her sword, and the women snapped back into battle lines as one. “You wish to turn back? We cannot keep all of your men as hostages, so we will kill the weak and keep the strong for work and breeding.”

Rastaban was shocked at her words. She spoke of his men...the same way his men spoke of women.