“Such fun,” said the blonde one. “You’ve had more food and a good night’s sleep.” He tried to protest, but his mouth was dry. “We give you a flagon of water and some sandwiches; we have nothing. You might well outrun us; we might have to subsist on nuts and berries. Even beetle grubs.” She giggled.
They sounded so cheerful. They sounded so confident.
“It’s just—” Strong fingers clamped his cheeks; bold eyes stared into his. “Don’t come back this way, Gilfort. I shouldn’t warn you, not really, but—the rules are, if you come back this way, we can do it all. Tear you. Slowly. Limb. From. Limb. We like it, but you probably wouldn’t. So best to run that way, Gilfort. We do it quickly, when it’s a running prey.”
“Like a deer,” one of the others said. “Prey, not sacrifice.”
“Attaboy,” said the brawny one, and they hauled him to his feet, attached the water flagon to his belt with care, tucked a packet of sandwiches in his pack, and unbound his hands. “That way,” the brawny one said again. “We give you ten Iron Jills head start.”
Gilfort staggered away, the stagger quickening to a run as his body found a use for all that adrenaline. Behind him, the first roar of the women: “Iron… JILL!” He leapt over a fallen log, raced down a little slope, splashed through the creek. “Iron JILL!” Up the slope on the far side, slipping in drifts of leaves, fingers desperate for a grip on branches, rocks, anything… on up, and up, a long gentle slope that offered his burning lungs no rest. “Iron JILL!” Down again at last, gasping, sweat burning his eyes, to another creek too wide to jump. He plunged into icy water, slipped on a rock and fell headlong. “Iron JILL!” came faintly from behind.
Hours later, sore, panting, blistered, stung, scraped, scratched, and very aware of his great good fortune, he emerged on the Hacksaw Pass road back to Technolalia. He had heard the strident call over and over, in those desperate hours, sometimes nearer, sometimes farther away, as the crazed pack of starving warrior women sought their lawful prey. But now he was at the road, and once over the pass he would be safe. Forever safe, because he certainly wasn’t ever coming back.
The crazed pack of starving warrior women, sprawled at ease on the soft spring turf of the clearing, burped in varying tones. A couple of hours after they’d sent Gilfort off, the supply cart arrived, complete with the festive foods appropriate to an Iron Jill retreat, including the molded chocolate statue of the Mother of All Women Warriors. It had taken the last coin in the treasury, but without the sacrificial chocolate, it just wasn’t an Iron Jill retreat.
They were full now, overfull, and hardly able to sing along when Dorcas and Eulalie (honorary inductees to the rites this year) struck up the traditional Hymn to Iron Jilclass="underline"
When night fell, the flames leaped high, and when the vision for which they had come, Iron Jill herself, walked among them… they rolled over and ate another piece of chocolate. Iron Jill smiled at her daughters, and her daughters smiled back.
Hand to Hand
Ereza stood in the shadows at the back of the concert hall. She had promised to be silent, to be motionless; interrupting the final rehearsal would, she had been told, cause untold damage. Damage. She had survived the bombing of her barracks; she had survived being buried in the rubble for two days, the amputation of an arm, the loss of friends and all her gear, and they thought interrupting a rehearsal caused damage? Had it not been her twin onstage, she might have said something. But for Arlashi’s sake she would ignore such narrow-minded silliness and do as she was told.
She had seen concerts, of course; she had even attended the first one in which Arlashi soloed. This was somewhat different. From the clear central dome the muted light of a rainy day lay over the rows of seats, dulling the rich colors of the upholstery. The stage, by contrast, looked almost garish under its warm-toned lights. Musicians out of uniform wore all sorts of odd clothes; it looked as if someone had collected rabble from a street fair and handed them instruments. Ereza had expected them to wear the kinds of things Arlashi wore, casual but elegant; here, Arlashi looked almost too formal in purple jersey and gray slacks. Instead of attentive silence before the music, she could hear scuffing feet, coughs and cleared throats, vague mutters. The conductor leaned down, pointing out something to Arlashi in the score; she pointed back; their heads finally moved in unison.
The conductor moved back to his podium and tapped it with his baton. “From measure sixty,” he said. Pages rustled, though most of the musicians seemed to be on the right one. Silence, then a last throat clearing, then silence again. Ereza shifted her weight to the other leg. Her stump ached savagely for a moment, then eased. Arla, she could see, was poised, her eyes on the conductor.
His hand moved; music began. Ereza listened for the bits she knew, from having heard Arla practice them at home. Arla had tried to explain, but it made no sense, not like real things. Music was either pretty or not; it either made her feel like laughing, or crying, or jumping around. You couldn’t say, as with artillery, what would work and what wouldn’t. This wasn’t one she knew without a program. It sounded pretty enough, serene as a spring evening in the garden. Arla’s right arm moved back and forth, the fingers of her left hand shifting up and down. Ereza watched her, relaxing into the sweetness of the music. This was the new cello, one of only four wooden cellos on the planet, made of wood from Scavel, part of the reparations payment imposed after the Third Insurrection. Cravor’s World, rich in military capacity, had far too few trees to waste one on a musical instrument. Ereza couldn’t hear the difference between it and the others Arla had played, but she knew Arla thought it important.
Her reverie shattered as something went drastically wrong with the music. She couldn’t tell what, but Arla’s red face and the conductor’s posture suggested who had caused the problem. Other instruments had straggled to a halt gracelessly, leaving silence for the conductor’s comment.
“Miss Fennaris!” Ereza was glad he wasn’t her commanding officer; she’d heard that tone, and felt a pang of sympathy for Arla. Somehow she’d thought musicians were more lenient than soldiers.
“So sorry,” Arla said. Her voice wavered; Ereza could tell she was fighting back tears. Poor dear; she hadn’t ever learned toughness. Behind her twin, two other musicians leaned together, murmuring. Across the stage, someone standing behind a group of drums leaned forward and fiddled with something on the side of one of them.
“From measure eighty-two,” said the conductor, this time not looking at Arla. Arla had the stubborn, withdrawn expression that Ereza knew well; she wasn’t going to admit anything was wrong, or share what was bothering her. Well, musicians were different, like all artists. It would go into her art, that’s what everyone said.
Ereza had no idea what measure eighty-two was, but she did recognize the honeyed sweetness of the opening phrase. Quickly, it became less sweet, brooding, as summer afternoons could thicken into menacing storms. She felt breathless, and did not know why. Arla’s face gave no clue, her expression almost sullen. Her fingers flickered up and down the neck of the cello and reminded Ereza of the last time she’d played the game Flight-test with her twin, last leave. Before the reopening of hostilities, before some long-buried agent put a bomb in the barracks and cost her her arm. Arla had won, she remembered, those quick fingers as nimble on the controls as on her instrument.