Amazon Chief (100 page)

I grinned at her.

"Queen Beria," said Tamma.

"Wait. Tamma, we're family. Maya uses 'queen' to make a point, but otherwise, both of you, please call me Beria."

She smiled and nodded. "Beria, congratulations. And I am so pleased you are fine."

"Thank you."

She turned to her sister. "Zora is going to
burn
when she hears."

* * * *

"Queen Beria," said Malora. I was just finishing my final event of the afternoon.

"You know, you could just call me 'Beria'. You've let me call you 'Malora' for years."

She smiled. "I would request a fairly private audience before dinner. I have been going back and forth about this, thinking I should wait, but I think it should be today."

"All right. Do we need anyone else?"

"My companion and Nori."

"Of course. Should I bring my companion?"

"You may, but it isn't necessary."

"All right. Your hut in ten minutes?"

"Perfect."

I had a hard time leaving the field. People kept stopping me. So it was more like fifteen minutes before I arrived at the hut. I knocked then entered. They were seated, and there was a bottle of wine open and a glass waiting for me. Maya held it for me, and I took the fourth seat.

I held the glass, sipping from it, then said, "Okay. What's up?"

"Take another sip then put that down," Malora suggested.

"Is this that serious?"

"You're going to react poorly."

I sighed, drank heavily from the glass, and set it down. I took a deep breath and then said, "I needed more stress today. Go ahead."

"Queen Beria-"

"I asked you not to call me that."

"It is appropriate right now," she said. "Just like it is when you call me that."

"All right. I'm sorry."

She smiled. "Queen Beria, I wish to retire."

"I think we did that already."

"
Now that I've said it officially, I will explain further. Beria, I want to retire."

"You said that."

"Honey," said Maya, "we're moving to Gallen's Cove."

I stared at her.

"You can't be serious. I need you!"

I looked at Nori. "Are you about to defect on me, too?"

"I'm tired," she said. "Yes."

"We'll stay for a season or so," Malora said. "But really, the queen always leaves, or everyone will always look at me when you issue an order. You won't really be queen as long as I'm here."

"The answer is no. You aren't going."

"Beria, listen to me," Malora said. "I don't want even one more day on the training grounds."

"Then you don't have to. Any of you. Problem handled."

"Please, Beria," she said. "I don't want another winter in these woods, in these huts. I hurt, Beria. I ache. It's not bad in the summer, but it is in the winter. I want a warm
house."

"So build one!"

"The weather on the coast is better."

"When were you there in the winter? Winters there suck!"

Maya smiled. "Not as much as they do here," she said. "And we took a trip a few years ago. It was a typical winter."

"There's no snow," Malora said. "The storms are nasty, and there's sometimes ice, but it melts. There's no walk across the village for the latrines. Another walk back. In the middle of the night during a howling blizzard."

"Honey pots!"

"Beria."

I stared at her. "Where will you go?" I asked Nori. "Back to Howard's Den?"

"It's just as bad there," Nori said. "No, Rora and I will go with Malora and Maya. We're going to share a household right next door to Ralla and Jasmine."

"Who will be our carpenter?"

"Narsana," Nori said. "Rora taught her everything she knows."

"So Narsana knew this was coming? For how long?"

"Narsana didn't know," Nori said, "But
Rora has been teaching Narsana for her entire life."

Narsana was Rora's daughter, after all.

"Beria, if you want a clean break, we can leave right away," Malora said. "Or if you want, we'll stay a season. But I would really like to be gone before it snows. Please."

"You dump this job on me, a job I don't even want, and I finally think I'm going to be able to see my sister every day again, and you're taking her away." It all fell down on me, and I started to sob. "You can't leave me now!"

Maya slipped from her chair and wrapped her arms around me. I sobbed into her shoulder.

"Malora hurts," she whispered to me. "She wanted to leave five years ago, but she was waiting for you to be ready. We want to go while we have years to enjoy. I'm going to teach her to sail, and she's going to fish. And we're going to adopt some children, maybe even some boys. I'm going to teach them, and Nori will train the ones who want to learn."

I pulled away and looked at Nori. "I do not want to ever fight a bandit that learned how to fight from you."

She laughed. "You won't."

"We'll stay until the fall," Malora said, "Unless you want us to leave sooner. Please, Beria. I do not want another winter here."

"We'll come visit in the summers," Maya said. "And you'll come visit, too. We'll see each other."

"Once a year? It was bad when I was only an hour away. Now it's almost a week."

"I'm sorry, Beria," Malora said. "I really am."

"You'll have everyone else," Maya said.

"This is part of the reason I waited a little longer," Malora said. "You have Lia, and I know she'll take care of you. And I know she can handle Maya's duties. But this is why we've pushed you harder than was fair, too. Beria, there were days last winter I needed help getting out of bed. Not wanted help. Needed help. If you hadn't been shielding me so well, someone would have challenged me years ago, and I would have lost, probably badly. I thank you from the bottom of my heart."

"Is there anything else?" I asked dully.

"No, honey," Maya said.

"I will give you my answer soon," I said.

I climbed to my feet, downed the last of my wine, and stumbled to the door.

They were leaving. My second mother. My sister. And, well, I didn't know what to think of about Nori, but I knew I loved her, and I always thought she'd be here. I couldn't imagine her leaving.

I found my way to Omie's hut. Lia, Omie and Aren were there. They took one look at me, and I found myself enveloped by all of them.

"What happened?"

"They want to leave. All of them. My sister wants to leave."

"Oh darling," Lia said, holding me more tightly. "I'm sorry."

"I told them no."

"Beria," said Omie.

"Shut up. I know I have to let them go, but not yet! I need them. I need all of you. They can't dump this job on me this morning, then tell me, oh by the way, you have to kill a woman. Then tell me this afternoon they're leaving me. They can't. I won't allow it!"

"The rest of us will be here for you," Omie said gently. "There are a lot of chiefs who want to retire, but all your friends are here."

"Not all of them!"

"All right, not quite all. But we'll take care of you."

I looked at her. "You will, won't you?"

"Haven't I always?"

"No. Maya did. You've only done it for the last twenty years. Omie, I'll almost never see them again."

"I know."

"Why did they have to tell me today? Why couldn't they have waited a while?"

"You're making decisions now. You needed to know, so you could plan. Housing. Personnel. Vorine and I aren't Nori. We're good with the companions, but we're as good as we're going to ever be, and there are five warriors here who are better than we are. And not a one of them is a good trainer."

"I can teach."

"Malora helped teach, but she had a lead trainer. You already started a search for a patrol coordinator. You need a new lead trainer here, too, and she has to be good. Damned good. Because she's the one who is going to keep you sharp."

I nodded.

"Beria, I'm sorry," said Aren. "I need to get back to the kitchen, and when you can spare her, I could use Lia."

I nodded. "Did you need Omie and me?"

"Need? No. Would I like your help and your company? Yes, I would."

"I am feeling petty and was thinking of sending the three of them to the kitchen."

Aren laughed. "Let me get there first and I won't let them leave until dinner is ready."

"I really shouldn't," I said. I sighed. "New rule. The three of you don't let me turn petty."

Omie smiled. "Got it."

"So I think I'll
invite
them to the kitchen instead."

* * * *

They came with us.

I let everyone else handle everything. Malora was amazing. She gave out the awards. Jasmine was handling several wagers. The stack of deer hides Lia won was truly amazing.

I
had asked Chief Mar about it privately. "Was that a bribe?"

She laughed. "Yes."

"You knew?"

"Oh please. Of course."

"Thank you."

"You won't have time to hunt. Now you won't have to for a very long time. Trade some of it for leather."

"And so, Malora's allies become mine?"

Her face clouded. "About that."

I sighed. "When did you want to leave?"

"There are a lot of us, Queen Beria. The old guard. We all want to retire while we can. We can stagger it over the next year or two. Some of us might last longer than that, but honestly, if I could and not dump too much on you, I'd be gone tomorrow."

"All right. I need someone to coordinate that. I don't want to deal with all of it at once, but I don't want you staying when you're ready to leave. Malora warned me some of you have already been asking, and she's been begging you to stay."

"She wanted you to have the choice of our replacements. Did you want a recommendation?"

"Please."

"Announce at the bonfire that you know some of the chiefs wish to retire, and then ask us to coordinate, just like you said. Send them to me, and I'll organize it, but my name is going to be near the top of the list."

"Where will you go?"

"Home. I'm from a little village only about fifty miles from Ping's new home. It's beautiful there, and I hope you'll come visit for a recruitment drive. Ping has been recruiting her area. I'll do mine. But if you came to visit, it would help immensely."

"You know how to get letters to me?"

"Yes."

"All right. Please organize this for me. Give me your recommendations as soon as you can."

"Do you want recommendations for chiefs?"

"You know Malora had me working on that already."

She laughed. "Yes, I knew."

"I'll talk to each chief individually. I may request a second meeting with any recommended replacements. I'll also want to know about anything else you care to share, especially personality conflicts I may need to address."

"You dealt with the worse personality conflict I knew about. Well done. You used a knife, right? You didn't just plunge your naked hand into her, did you?"

I grinned. "Did you see a knife?"

"No, I didn't."

And so, Malora invested me with an award for the winner of the tournament. "You don't get a prize," she said. "Or else you got the grand prize. However you want to think of it."

"I'm not sure it's a prize," I said. "But thank you."

Haldara, Tenda and I received awards for good sporting conduct. Malora was effusive in her praise.

Maya had a variety of small awards as well.

And then Malora gave a short speech thanking everyone for the years of support she's received from them. She finished by introducing, "Our new queen."

I stood up and hugged her for a long time.

"I'm not going to make a speech," I said. "Except this. Queen Malora, speaking for everyone here, I can never tell you how much your leadership has meant to us. There are not enough thank yous in the world."

I pulled her up for another hug.

"Maya, you have been the heart of the Amazons the entire time I have been here. Thank you." She got a hug, too.

"I know:
that's not very effusive. But there just aren't the words. So it will have to do."

I addressed the chiefs first, handling it just as Mar had suggested.

Then I grew serious. "This afternoon, Queen Malora, Maya and Nori asked to meet with me. They asked permission to depart our forest."

There was an outcry that could basically be described as, "No, don't let them go."