Jiva glanced at him. “What idiocy are you talking about?”
“The refugees who came to us several weeks ago talk about an axe woman who faced forty Paikans on her own, defending Lesser Khaim from the Culling, until she fell from a sleeping spell they cast on her.”
“Paikans don’t use magic,” Jiva said. “And if she is really the Executioness, she wasn’t exactly killing them by the gross here, was she?”
I cleared my throat. “You interrupted me.”
“Come with us and go back to your home, like the rest of us,” Jiva said. “We will give you some water and food, what we can spare. The Alacaners will be excited to see you. Be glad you live.”
“I am not glad I live,” I shouted at him. “I do not share your cowardice! The Paikans stole my family from me. They burned my home to the ground. I have nothing left. Nothing but the hope of getting to Paika.”
Jiva glowered. “I am here for the same reason. To fight back against the cullings. They took a daughter of mine, and I want my vengeance. But to call me a coward, well, it seems that you are eager to get yourself killed tonight.”
“And you aren’t?” I looked at the commanders around him. “The Paikans are looking for you, aren’t they? My caravan was not the thing they came to destroy, was it? We were just a bonus. If you break apart to hide, it will be easier for them to take their time and seek out your parts.”
Jiva’s commanders looked at each other. “She is right. Once we split up, they can take their time to hunt us down one by one, like dogs.”
“We have little in the way of supplies,” Jiva said. “And, judging by the force that attacked your caravan, which is two hundred or so strong, with twelve war elephants you say, we are outmanned. Fighting men are in short supply throughout the lands, thanks to the culling. We don’t have many horses for cavalry. The fight is over.”
I shook my head. “The fight isn’t over, you are just not able to see how best to bring it to them.”
“You think you are a better commander than me?”
“No,” I said. “I know nothing about armies or supply trains. But I do see the things that men do not.”
Jiva, at first furious, now snapped his fingers. “Then, tell me what you see that I do not, woman, and I’ll judge your words.”
I had caught him, like a fish, and had his interest. “You think about their numbers, and whether you can compare yours to theirs, like two boys seeing who can piss the furthest.”
As I had intended, the warlord jerked back from my words as if slapped. “Listen, axe-bitch…”
I spoke with a low voice, completely forcing him to stop in order to hear what I was saying. His commanders leaned forward. “The Paikans control the road. You can skulk in the woods like this, avoiding confrontation. Or you get an army so vast there is no hope for the Paikans at all.”
“Since we have no vast army, but a couple hundred men, you think we should remain here, starving and hidden?” Jiva asked.
“No, starving accomplishes nothing,” I said. “But with only two hundred men, you are not of much use. No, what I propose is you let me help you build an army so vast, so large, the Paikans will have no choice but to fold. They might not even choose to fight.”
And, I thought, we would win the battle before even setting foot on the field.
Jiva folded his arms and laughed at me. “And where shall I find that army, Executioness? Shall I pull it out of my ass? Will you magic all the trees in this forest to suddenly take up my cause?”
I did not say anything, or change my expression, but waited, until one of the commanders repeated Jiva’s question, “where will you find this army?”
“The lands are short of young men, due to the culling. But they are not short of angry, venomous mothers like me, whose families have been destroyed, and their towns scattered. And yet they live. They were the backbone of the caravan, before it was destroyed today. They haggle and trade in towns all up and down the coast. No doubt they even helped supply your army at times. There is your army, Jiva: an army of Executionesses, ready to throw themselves at the walls of Paika, like I am. No less thirsty for blood, no less able to be led into battle. No less able to kill when armed well.”
Jiva unfolded his arms. “They will not fight as well as a man.”
“Face me with your sword then, and find out how well a woman can fight,” I said.
Jiva eyed my axe. Then he pointed at one of his commanders.
The man stepped forward, and his sword flashed out, faster than I had expected, but I shoved it aside with the axe clumsily.
On the second swing, I caught the blade in the curve of the axe’s blade, and then spun the axe handle about to crack the man under the chin while his sword was still held away. I leapt back from his next slice, and smiled to see the blood and cracked teeth in his mouth.
He growled then, and began slashing quickly at me. I backed up further and further into the water as I kept the long blade away, almost tripping over my skirts in the mud that oozed under me.
We grunted, striking and clanging steel together. He was stronger, he was faster, and he would take me down.
But I refused him an easy kill.
By the end, we both stood in hip-deep water, panting, sizing each other up, when Jiva finally stood up from where he’d been squatting. “Good enough,” he said. “Good enough. What will we arm this new army with?”
“Arquebuses where you can afford it,” I said over my shoulder, still eyeing the commander before me. “Axes where you cannot.”
“An arquebus is an expensive weapon for vain lords and the rich caravan. Do I look made of gold?” But I could hear in his voice that I had won. That he was taking me seriously.
“It took me a week to learn to shoot the arquebus. You’d have an army in that time.”
“Anything else you want of me, besides what little fortune my army has amassed, then?”
With my axe still in front of me, I looked over at him. “Yes, I have another demand. We need a woman, called Anezka, from the caravan, if your scouts can find her among the survivors who are fleeing. She will be our link to getting us the supplies we need, and a new army.”
Jiva clapped his hands. “It will be done, if she is alive and can be found. Now both of you, come in from the water, we need to return to camp and rest. Tomorrow we need to get further into the woods.”
I held my axe in one hand, and held out my other to my opponent.
He spat a tooth out, and then grinned and took it.
Part Four
It did not happen as quickly as I wanted. But, it happened nonetheless.
First, with Anezka by my side, we recruited tallywomen from the remains of the caravan, and hagglers from the nearby villages. They melted off into the chill of the Northern forests with us, where the Paikans had to get off their horses and brave the bramble and tight brush.
Forges in half-destroyed towns built arquebus barrels, and woodsmen in the remains of once-great cities crafted stocks. Women all over began to carry axes, no matter where they went, or what hour of day it was.
And the Paikans did not know, for women taught other women how to fight with an axe or reload their arquebuses, and those women taught others. And what men paid close attention to what women did together?
Too few.
And those few that paid too much attention, found an axe buried in their skull.
Anezka’s old caravan contacts kept food and supplies moving throughout old forest trails to us. Destroyed by the lack of trade and cullings, many were all too happy to help us in revenge for the caravan’s destruction and antipathy to Paika. They even brought word of purges in Khaim, strange stories about the streets running with blood and the air above them glowing blue.
Jiva slunk into a gloom after the first months. “An army of widows,” he complained. “We will be laughed at and destroyed.”
