The Amazon

Ch. 1- The Surrender

They were trapped, and there was no doubt about it. Kussara looked down from the fort ramparts at the orcs who lurked around the base of the hill. They mostly kept out of sight, but the signs were unmistakable. The thick jungle underbrush stirred out of time with the wind, the birds were quiet, and the faint stench of orc was on the breeze.

Somewhere far down the slope lay the bodies of her fellow Amazons who had not survived the ambush, and perhaps five miles further than that, her galleys still sat beached on the shore. They had come to the island to raid, to win gold and glory in service of their city, only to fall victim to the gods' caprices.

Their retreat cut off, they had fled the only direction they could, up the hill to an abandoned fort that overlooked the sea. From here, she and her fifty warriors had hoped to signal their galleys for aid, but there was no reply to their smoke signal.

"We're on our last rations, Strategissa."

Kussara turned from the ramparts. Her lieutenants Nesa and Dazida stood on the wall's crumbling stair, both with bows in hand and their spears slung over their backs. Like the other warriors, they were exhausted and wore their despair on their faces.

"We should surrender," said Dazida, her face gray. Nesa scowled a mighty scowl in response. She slammed her spear butt against the stone, knocking off a loose piece that fell to the dirt of the bailey.

"Never! I know what these orcs mean to do with us! Death in battle is more honorable and more preferable to a live of slavery among these bestial creatures! Strategissa, give the order and we will charge out to meet them. Let us slay some of these curs before we die, that they may always remember the price of battling the Amazons!"

Nesa thrust her spear high and whooped a war cry that was joined by only a few below. Dazida shook her head.

"We can negotiate with them. Our sisters will pay the ransom, we will be able to go home to Amra, eventually."

"I would rather die, Strategissa!"

"Let us put it to the warriors," Kussara decided. She waved her lieutenants down the stairs and turned to the bailey. "All warriors come together," she called down in a booming voice. "It is time to decide our fate."

Her warriors raised themselves from where they lay or sat, waiting for the end. Despite their situation, they all still carried their weapons at the ready-bows, spears, arquebuses, swords, and clubs ready for battle. Armor gleamed, for they had had little to do in the old fort but polish it while they waited, but she knew already this was not a company fit for battle. They were defeated already; she could see it in their eyes. The vote would be only a formality.

"I can see no help coming from our ships," she said once they had gathered. "We are down to our last rations. It is time to decide. Nesa argues that we should sally against the orcs and die gloriously in battle. Dazida proposes we ask for terms of surrender. I cannot decide the fate of my warriors alone, thus I put the matter to a vote. Let all who would sally with Nesa say aye."

Nesa cried "Aye!" with a fiery roar but was joined by a mere three others. Kussara sadly shook her head.

"Let all who would ask for terms say aye."

The response lacked all enthusiasm but was louder still. Kussara saw that many did not offer their voice, but the vote was decided all the same.

"Very well," she sighed, and she could see tears welling up in the eyes of her warriors. "Who will carry the message to our foes?"

Thortussa stepped forward, a proud young warrior of the Leopard Lodge.

"I will go forth and ask for their terms," she boomed. Kussara nodded. Thortussa was a good choice. She was brave and swift, unlikely to be cowed by the wretched orcs, nor caught in their ambush.

"Then go, and may we all be home in Amra soon, gods willing."

Her lookouts gave the all clear, and the rusted hinges of the fort creaked once again. The old gate opened a crack, just enough for the lean Thortussa to slip through, and then boomed shut once again. In the harsh light of the afternoon sun, the tall Amazon began to make her way down the slope.

Kussara sat on the parapet waiting for her emissary to return, feeling the hot sun beat down on her the whole while. Countless times she found herself staring out to sea, hoping that she would spy a great fleet coming to her rescue.

Yet the sea was as empty as ever. There was not even a sign of her own ships. She wondered whether the orcs had taken them unaware, too? Pulled up on the beach as she had left them, with only a few warriors in defense, they could have been taken by surprise from either sea or land. Had they known she was coming?

She thought back to Amra, where she had raised her followers and outfitted her ships. Had word of her destination gotten out? Had some merchant warned the orcs?

Thortussa was coming back up the hill. Kussara stood up, eager for news. Yet from the Amazon's posture, she knew right away she would be disappointed.

The gateway opened and the defeated warriors gathered to hear their fate. Thortussa climbed three steps of the stair to address the company and sighed.

"The orcs demand that we surrender ourselves entirely into their hands. They mean to make us slaves."

The warriors groaned. Someone wailed in despair.

"What of a ransom?" cried Dazida.

"They will arrange no ransom," replied Thortussa. "If our sisters mean to buy us out of slavery, they will take silver or payment in kind, but no messengers will be sent, nor will we be afforded the privilege of captivity."

"We should fight!" cried Nesa, and a slight murmur went through the company. Thortussa shook her head.

"I was taken into their town," she replied. "They have many warriors ready for battle."

"How many?" Kussara demanded.

"Five hundred at least. We are outnumbered ten to one."

"I do not fight to survive!" Nesa replied. "I fight to avoid slavery!"

The company muttered in weak agreement. Kussara sat against the wall, her heart too heavy to move. They had come here to take plunder and win glory and found themselves as the plunder instead. The fog of despair lay heavy over them all, except for Nesa.

"Strategissa," called Nesa. "Can you bear this disgrace befalling your company?"

Kussara felt the eyes of her whole company upon her, but she could not address the question.

"They make no mention of our ships," Kussara noted. They must already have them, she thought darkly.

"There's no escape," someone cried, and a fresh murmur of despair went over the company.

"We must ask for better terms," Nesa pressed.

"Ask that one of us be spared," Kussara commanded. "The rest of us will go into slavery but send one of us back to Amra to bring news of the defeat. She can return with silver and buy our freedom again."

"How will she get there alone?" Dazida asked. Kussara had no answer.

"Merchants sail between the isles," Thortussa supplied, and once again Kussara thought of the spy who had betrayed her to the orcs. "Our warrior will sail with them back to Amra."

"Very well, it is decided." Kussara did not want to waste time with the ritual of another vote, for there seemed to be no dissent. "Offer them these as our terms and pray to the gods to have mercy upon us."

Thortussa clapped a fist to her chest in acknowledgement, then the gate opened and she went out again. Kussara found she had not the strength to climb back to the parapet and watch and instead sheltered from the sun in the shadow of the fort's crumbling tower. After another long wait, Thortussa returned.

"They have agreed," she said simply, her face ashen. Her eyes were wet, and there was hardly a dry eye in the fort. Kussara rose from the shadow of the tower and climbed the stair to address the company that she had led into ruin.

"All that remains is to decide who will carry word back to Amra."

The matter was put to a vote and Thortussa was chosen as the fortunate one. The others sadly shambled toward the gate, ready to surrender themselves to their fates. The lookouts opened the gate wide and then descended to the bailey to join the sad procession.

"They said to leave all our weapons and packs behind," said Thortussa sadly, and the warriors turned from the gate to throw down their weapons and packs.

Kussara left behind her bow of goldenwood, her Vaedian steel sword, and three spears. She removed from her belt her two daggers and threw them onto the pile of weapons her sisters-in-arms were building, her tears stinging her eyes.

There was much weeping and gnashing of teeth at their sad predicament, but the company disarmed and unburdened itself together. They ate their last rations in silence and drank what water was left. Then, with Kussara at their head, then began the slow descent from the fort.

The orcs emerged from the jungle to taunt them. They rose up from ferns and behind trees, jeering and shaking their spears. Squat, hunched figures with skin ranging from green to gray, they made a hideous sight, even at a distance. With flat noses, jutting tusks, and long snouts, orcs were among the ugliest creatures of the gods' creation. Kussara felt her heart flutter at the thought of being under their fists, but it was preferable to death, if only barely.

They passed one of her fallen warriors on the trail, still lying where she had been slain in the retreat two days earlier. Everything of value had been stripped from the body before it was left to rot in the jungle, and Kussara could only curse the sacrilege of leaving a body without proper funeral rites. She wanted to stop, to bury her fallen sister, but the orcs who now shadowed her column shouting cruel taunts threatened to fall upon them if they tarried. She marched on, vowing to bury her fallen once she was returned to Amra.

An orc with a long, stout saber suddenly stood before them on the trail, accompanied by a man in rags. The orc grunted something that sounded threatening, then prodded the man, who, to Kussara's surprise, spoke in the tongue of the Amazons.

"The place of surrender is not far. I will show you the way."

"Who are you?" Kussara demanded. "One of the orcs' pets?"

"I am Hurran," the man replied. "I was born in the city of Lykyra to a fisherwoman and her husband."

"You are slave to this orc?"

"No, to their king. He is Nashurok, and he awaits your company at the field ahead."

Hurran led them along the trail, which soon enough turned into a road. Kussara knew this place, for not far ahead was the crossroads where her company had been ambushed. She wondered how many of her warriors still lay unburied there.

They passed an orc leading a herd of pigs in the other direction. The orc accompanying Hurran ordered them off the road so that the swineherd and his beasts could pass, and Kussara found the gesture more humiliating than even having to leave behind her bow. She and her warriors stood in the roadside brush, eyes downcast, as the pigs grunted past, and contemplated their misfortune. The orcs who had followed them from the fort had disappeared, most likely gone to plunder the weapons left behind, and she was grateful for their absence.

When the pigs were past and the road was clear, the orc still waited until they rounded the bend out of sight before he led them on. They emerged from the jungle and into a wide, fallow field. Before them stretched a wide plain broken by a river, and beyond that the wooden walls of the orcish town. The fields were tilled by slaves, who stopped their toil to stare at those about to join their misery. Waiting for them in the field was the orc king, born on a garishly painted palanquin carried by naked slaves and attended by a hundred warriors in armor of hide and cotton.

"Behold, your conqueror!" Hurran called. "Nashurok, King of Tortaskr, Tyrant of Drushnir, Despot of Kizru, and Lord of Arzogh! You are now his slaves, and will obey his commands to the death."

The Amazons received his words mutely. Their spirits were already broken by defeat, and Kussara thought there was nothing that could bring them lower. The orc king spoke a single word in his harsh, guttural tongue, and Hurran nodded.

"Your king commands you to strip," he said, and Kussara felt her heart drop. Strip? Here? In front of all the orcs? "You are now his slaves," Hurran reminded her, and the orc king's warriors took a menacing step forward. A shudder went through the Amazons and like sheep they crowded together for safety.

But there was no safety to be found from the orcs. They leveled their spears at their prisoners, and Kussara nodded. She would bear their torments until she was freed.

"Very well," she said, her voice shaking. "But first, my emissary must be set free to find a ship home."

Hurran spoke to the orc king, and the king waved his hand in dismissal.

"Nashurok says to name your messenger, and the rest will be reduced to slavery. But it is useless. There will be no escape from slavery for you."

"Thortussa," Kussara called, and the tall warrior stepped forward. "This is my emissary. I demand that you swear not to harm or impede her and treat her with the respect due to an emissary between peoples."

Hurran relayed the message, and the king summoned forth some orcish priest to oversee his oath. He beckoned Thortussa to his side, away from her sisters-in-arms, and loudly spoke the oaths in his grating tongue before Hurran translated for the others.

"My king swears in sight of the gods to do so, and should he break his oath may his strength wither and the sea's crabs feast upon his flesh until he is naught but bone. It is so sworn. Now, he commands his slaves to strip."

Kussara could think of nothing else to delay their debasement. She turned to her company with a look of sorrow and found the same look thrown back at her. Only Nesa stared in fury for all the rest were given over to despair.

She discarded her helm, then reached up and unfastened her bronze cuirass. She let it fall to the ground with a thud, and she began to undress. Her warriors followed suit, their armor and clothes coming off slowly and all the while the orcs looked on with glee.

They stripped to nothing but their sandals, some warriors sobbing, others bitterly defiant, but all defeated and despairing. The orcs crept forward, some to snatch a piece of plunder, others to grab at their slaves.

One gray-skinned, slack-jawed creature grabbed at Kussara's bare breast, his yellow eyes full of lust for the great orbs of flesh she proudly bore on her chest. She slapped his hand away, feeling some fire return to her, and the orc hissed at her.

"Slave! Slave!" he snarled, three more coming forth to join him. Kussara took an unconscious step back, indignation giving way to fear. She was naked and outnumbered but determined to sell herself bitterly.

She retreated into the press of her other warriors, all of them, too, naked and vulnerable. She felt the press of their bare flesh against her back, warm, soft, and inviting before the terrible sea of gray and green before her. The orcs were not deterred and flocked from their king's side to crowd around their slaves. They jeered in their own tongue and made gestures that could not be misunderstood, some already beginning to undress themselves. Kussara felt the bile rising in her throat and regretted choosing slavery over death.

The orcs drew close to their defensive circle, hands grasping and lips smacking. Long red tongues lolled about on their hideous face. One orc approached Kussara with his hand under his mail, stroking his cock like a foreign man unaccustomed to behaving before an Amazon. He reached for Kussara's breasts as the first one had, and she caught him by the wrists. His companions surged forward, grabbing at her arms and pulling her forward. Her sisters-in-arms pulled her back, and she because caught in the struggle, unable to move but determined to bring down the grasping orc if she went.

Nesa screamed in the face of one orc who came too close, then lunged forward and shoved him to the ground. She grabbed at the knife in his belt, but two other orcs immediately set upon her and wrestled her to the dirt. The throng of orcs surged forward, wrestling and pulling Amazons out of their tight knot. Kussara was thrown to the dirt, losing her grip on the orc, and had the wind knocked out of her. She came up on her back with a leering orc straddling her. His amber, slitted eyes fixed her with a cruel promise, and the long tongue that stuck out between his yellowed teeth strained to lick her bare skin.

There then came a blast of a horn, and the orcs quailed. King Nashurok called to his warriors, and they reluctantly drew back, casting pleading looks at him as they did. Relieved, Kussara let herself relax, only to tense up again when a group of orcs appeared on the road with a long chain.

"Your king demands that you be chained at the neck," said Hurran. "Then you will be marched into town."

Kussara could not make a reply. The orc atop her stood, then reached down and yanked her to her feet. The Amazons were all brought to the road and formed into a line, after which the orcs went along them and collared each of them. The collars were each then chained to the collars before and after them, forming the fifty of the Amazons into a single coffle. Kussara felt her heart break to see her warriors reduced so low, and it was all her fault.

She was led to the front of the column by an orc who took the opportunity to grope her breasts, then between her legs. His clawed, leathery fingers made her skin crawl, but there was no resistance left in her. He fastened the cold iron collar about her neck and licked her lips. Kussara felt herself shudder. The orc looked behind her, then grabbed her breasts with both hands. Kussara cried in alarm, and he squeezed, then extended his long red tongue to lick a slobbering line around and over her nipples, then up her chest to her neck. He kissed her cheek, and she choked back bile and a sob.

He smiled hungrily at her, then stepped behind her. She heard the clank of chains and felt the weight of the chain now attached to the back of her collar. Tears stung her eyes, and she could not bear to look up from the dirt beneath her feet.

"Gods," she whispered to herself. "What have I done to deserve this? Tell me, and I will make it right. If you give me my freedom, I will sacrifice a hundred head of cattle once I am home safe. Bring my warriors home and I will make a sacrifice in thanks greater than anything made to you before. But do not leave me to suffer in thrall to these monsters."

There was no response to her prayer. Behind her, she heard someone else sob, then someone--likely Nesa--scream. There was the sound of a brief fight, and then all was quiet again except for the clank of chains. At last, Kussara lifted her head from the road and looked back.

There, she saw all of her warriors in a long line, each naked except for her sandals and chained at the neck to the warrior in front and behind her. The orcs moved between them, binding their hands to prohibit further resistance. All along the column, orcs with whips moved into position to drive them on. And at the very back, the king on his palanquin watched his slaves march into his town.

The bindings were finished, the whips cracked, and Kussara somberly began to march forward, unable to imagine what horrors awaited her in the orcs' town.