Arms-Commander

LXXVII

Even as late as mid afternoon on sixday, Saryn’s head still ached, if dully, as she rode northward along the road back to Lornth. She hadn’t slept that well, unsurprisingly, not with her thoughts flitting among all the possibilities for rebellion she had envisioned, but hard biscuits and cheese had helped some in dulling the ache.

An early-morning shower had momentarily cooled the air, but that cool had turned into a steamy heat as the day wore on and as the white sun beat down through a clear green-blue sky. The road had been empty, except for the guards, and the dust kicked up by the horses was not quite so bad as on previous days, but Saryn would have traded the steamy harvest heat for dust and drier air in a moment.

In addition to the headache, she kept seeing images of the mostly young men whom she had killed, their bloody bodies strewn across the Tryendan hillside…and the bewildered look of the undercaptain when confronted with a woman in authority and the almost-sullen responses, as if she had no right to question him.

Why, Klarisa had asked, and Saryn had answered. The more she thought, however, the less she liked what she’d said. Oh…her words had been right…so far as they went, but what bothered her was the feeling that everything she and the guards had done so far was almost meaningless. Why were they doing what they were doing? So that a spoiled boy could become Overlord of Lornth, carrying forward the same attitudes that had created the first attacks on Westwind? So that more young men and women would fight and die in the future?

She should have thought about all that earlier, far earlier-but she truly hadn’t understood, not emotionally, the depth of the misogynism embedded in the Lornian culture. Why not? What had changed her understanding? The fanatical male insistence on tradition, to the point of senseless death after senseless death? Or the inability or unwillingness to accept the superiority of a female force? The old Cyadoran dwelling, with its entire structure designed to restrain women?

And what can you do about it so all the deaths won’t have been in vain?

“You look worried, Commander,” offered Klarisa.

“I have to say that I am,” Saryn admitted. “Every time we fight, we prove how good we are, how capable. Then we have to do it again…and again, and the men in this place keep looking bewildered…or angry…as if we were demons, not women.”

“That’s how they see us. The worst of the white demons are women. They have to be chained with gold chains to keep them from tempting men into chaos.”

“They believe that here?” Saryn couldn’t keep the incredulity out of her voice. “They really do?”

“Not everyone, but most folk, especially in old towns and hamlets in the south.”

“But…women have never had any power in Candar, not even in old Cyador. That doesn’t make any sense.”

Klarisa shrugged. “That’s the way they feel. Even my father called my sister and me his little demons. He was better than most. When he died, and we had to live with Uncle Saemat…that was when I left.”

Why hadn’t Saryn asked Klarisa or one of the guards from Lornth earlier? She shook her head. Because you didn’t know enough to ask the questions, not until after a few battles and seeing that old Cyadoran dwelling.

Oh, in retrospect, it all made sense, if in a perfectly logical and twisted way, but it also made Saryn’s last question even harder to answer.

Just what can you do to change things so history doesn’t keep repeating itself?