Aria and Talia

Part 4

By Shadowdancer

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Part 4

 

“That means that a warrior from a rival tribe dressed as one of my warriors, snuck into the village, fired that arrow at Talia, and got out without ever being seen or captured”.  Xena thought it unlikely that such a thing could happen; in an Amazon village, all the sisters were known to one another not just by sight, but by sound. That way, they could find and identify one another in the forest vocally by birdcalls , or if they were close enough to one another but couldn’t see each other, verbally. It was unlikely that a strange amazon had gotten into the village and no one saw her. Even in a village as large as Danalia’s, every single amazon knew the other members of her tribe by sight, and could usually identify the members of the elder warrior class by their voices alone. Danalia insisted that the young ones learn to identify every member of the tribe vocally and visually. Xena didn’t guess that Aria’s tribe was any different in the familiarity part anyway. 

“I don’t think so Aria, I don’t think it’s possible. You have sentries posted in the trees along the perimeter day and night in turn I assume?” “No, only at night, during the day, there are enough warriors in and out of the village at intervals to guard against attack. The young warriors who have never fought in a battle never leave the village unless escorted by an older warrior with experience. The young girls who are still training never leave the village unless they are with at least two experienced, fully armed warriors.  The infants and toddlers are of course with their mothers at night and in the nursery Yert during the day while their mothers attend to their duties to the tribe”. 

“Boy, I thought Danalia’s tribe was locked down” Gabrielle commented in a lower tone to Xena.  Xena was apprehensive about suggesting that it had to be someone within the tribe if what Aria said were true, but it had to be said. “No, I refuse to believe that any of my warriors wanted to kill Talia much less that one of them would actually do it. Not my warriors, no, there has to be some other explanation, there has to be”. Xena was sorry that she’d upset Aria, but it had to be said, and the more she thought about it, the more she was certain that they had to look within the tribe for the killer. In as quiet, and gentle a voice as she could, Xena asked, “Aria, did she have any enemies in the tribe? Or anyone who you think might have been respectful to her face, but who secretly hated her?”. 

She hated to have to confront Aria with this only two days after the murder, and the day after the funeral, but they had to find the killer before Aria was killed as well. If the killer had assassinated Talia in order to attain her rank somehow, than Aria was probably next. “No, no one” Aria said, dropping exhaustedly into her chair, the weight of the knowledge that someone in her tribe, one of her own warriors  had killed Talia, had drained her strength. Suddenly, a name slammed into her mind, “Moraga, she couldn’t stand Talia, she and Talia stayed away from one another whenever possible. They always made a point to avoid each other, purposely diverting their paths when walking through the village. Even as children, they never got along. I remember them fighting once as children with chobos, they nearly beat each other to death”.   

“Chobos? You have to be skilled to fight with those, and very quick; you can kill somebody with those things. Xena once fought Queen Melosa with chobos”. Aria nodded, “They were both very skilled, at a very young age they could both match much older warriors in nearly every amazon skill, but Talia had a slight edge in hand to hand combat and with weaponry. Moraga was a bit quicker in the trees than Talia especially when they got older, and Talia grew in height. It made her a bit more awkward in the trees, until she learned to adjust for her own height, but still Moraga was a bit quicker”.  “Why did they hate each other so much?” Gabrielle asked. 

Aria shrugged, “I’m not really sure, some people just never take to each other, those two always hated each other. Moraga and Talia were in the trees once, and Moraga snuck up behind Talia who was squatting in the joint of two branches in this enormous tree, and Moraga purposely spooked Talia, and she fell out. Luckily she grabbed the branch below her just in time, mostly out of reflex I think, but to this day, I swear I saw Moraga stamp on one of Talia’s hands because Talia fell out of the tree moments after I saw Moraga step forward toward where Talia was hanging from the branch below her.  Luckily Talia only broke her leg, she could have been killed if she’d hit her head. They were only twelve at the time; ever since that day, Talia always limped on her left leg.  It healed properly, but it was just never the same again”. 

“Wow, a twelve year old girl did that to another? Purposely?” Gabrielle said in astonishment. “Yes” Aria said with a nod, that wasn’t the last time she did something like that either, but Talia never retaliated until one day when she’d just had enough and couldn’t take it any more. Talia was eight months pregnant with her first daughter, Taria, and she went out hunting alone, or so she thought, despite my order that she allow her bodyguards to stay with her. She always was stubborn as a mule; but anyway, that morning, at dawn, as usual, she got up, dressed, went to bathe in the lake, came back and got me up, then told me she was going hunting before breakfast. I wasn’t happy about her continuing to hunt while she was so heavy with her first heir, but trying to stop Talia from doing what she wanted was like trying to tell the gods what to do. I told her to at least take her bodyguards, and she got upset, and said she could still take fight if she had to, and stormed out”. Aria shook her head at the memory of her Bondmate’s stubbornness.  

“What happened?” Gabrielle asked as she and Xena sat in nearby chairs, “I dressed, and ordered two of my best warriors to follow her but not let her know that she was being followed, and they did. What I didn’t know until later when the warriors who’d followed Talia recounted the incident to me told me that Moraga had evidently also followed Talia into the woods, most likely following her in the trees”.  “But she didn’t see Talia’s guards following her as well? That’s odd”. “She was probably too intent on her target to notice them; the two I’d sent to follow Talia were ground runners, Amazons who are better at tracking and following on the ground than in the trees, so Moraga may likely never have noticed them if she was concentrating on Talia”. “And they never noticed her because she was probably in the trees where she was better at” Xena commented, “Most likely” Aria said with a nod. “So Moraga waited until Talia stopped and then attacked Talia right?”.  

“Right. She dropped down on Talia from above, shoving her to the ground, and onto her stomach, luckily, Talia was very quick to react, and instinctively shifted their combined weight off of her stomach as fast as she could, throwing Moraga to the ground behind her, and falling to her back herself. She was afraid that serious damage may have already been done, but she didn’t have time to think about that, as far as she knew, she was alone. She got to her feet, notched an arrow to her bow and had it pointed at Moraga’s face before she could even recover from being thrown to her back. Under any other circumstance, she could have taken care of Moraga alone, but her first thought was the baby she carried, and getting help as soon as she could, so she gave the distress call, not realizing that the guards were right there and running to her assistance”.

“What happened to the baby? Was it hurt?” “In away. When she’d gotten to her feet, and the guards were bringing Moraga back here to the village, Lorzara, one of the guards, saw Talia double over and hold an arm to her stomach. She said she was afraid the baby was lost, but knowing Talia’s pride, she said nothing, and instructed one of the others who’d come in answer to Talia’s distress call to see to her, and help her back to the village and directly to Melana’s Yert.  When the baby was born a month later, she seemed unharmed from the incident, it wasn’t until much later when we realized that something was wrong. She responded to very little around her other than my touch or Talia’s touch; we were the only ones who could touch her, or hold her without her screaming as if someone were killing her. Other than that, she would just sit, or lie wherever she was put down, never crying for food, or to be changed, never making a sound unless someone tried to touch her other than one of us”. 

Gabrielle was very near to tears, and even Xena was saddened by the tale; she may have been a battle hardened warrior, but she wasn’t heartless. “What happened to Moraga?”. “She was banished, but she lives alone nearby, in the woods to the North East about a mile or so from here”.  “You allow her to stay that close?” Xena asked, “We can banish her from the tribe, and from the woods that we claim as ours, but nothing more. As long as she doesn’t come inside the village boundaries or our woods there’s nothing we can do”.  “What happened to the baby? To, Taria? Was it?” She wandered off alone one day when she was about three seasons old, and stepped off of a cliff, falling to her death. A young amazon noticed her walking away unattended, and followed her, but the grass was taller than Taria that season, and by the time the young one spotted Taria again, it was too late, she was too close to the cliff edge to get to her in time to stop her. She ran back as fast as she could to get help but there was nothing anybody could do; we couldn’t even get to her body to retrieve it for burial”.  

Gabrielle wasn’t “near to tears” this time, she crying freely, and even Xena was close to it herself. “That’s why none of the young girls are allowed out of the village unless they’re with an adult” Xena stated, Aria nodded, “Talia has never gone, never went, to that field again, she never even looked in that direction again”.  “How horrible, it’s terrible enough to loose a child, but then not be able to bury her, she couldn’t get . She must have been in so much pain and grief”.  “She was, I couldn’t get her to leave the side of the cliff for days on end. Day and night, she sat there, staring into space, refusing to leave Taria’s side. I would go and take her food in the morning, midday, and at night, but it would sit untouched, she wouldn’t even drink. I started to sit, and feed her until she wouldn’t eat any more, but even then she refused to eat more than a few mouthfuls, or drink more than a few sips”.  

As Aria recounted this part, she sat there glassy eyed, seeing it in her mind, “Eventually, the buzzards began to come, and she would shoot at them with her arrows, yelling her war cry, but it wasn’t hard to stay out of range of her arrows, and well….” Gabrielle gasped in horror. That was when she finally gave up the vigil, she collapsed to the ground crying and screaming in pain and frustration, and grief. I’d never seen her like that in my life. I went to her and after awhile, she came back with me. I called a warrior to me, and asked her to run ahead and ask the others to avert their eyes when we entered the village. Talia had a great deal of pride, and for the others to see her like that would have humiliated her, even though they all sympathized with her, and thought no less of her”.  

Her mind lost in the memory of Talia, despite her best effort, a tear slipped from Aria’s soft blue eyes, one, single, tear of grief for a lost love.  Gabrielle knew that as long as she and Xena were there, that’s the only sign of grief they were likely to see from Aria, but she knew how she must cry at night at the loss of Talia.  She hadn’t known them very long, but Gabrielle could tell how much they adored each other; the love, and fondness for one another was in their eyes. Now that she thought about it, they had reminded her of she and Xena. Talia had been strong, silent, controlled, stoic, and Aria, emotionally demonstrative, outgoing, easy mannered one, the complete opposite of Talia. That was probably why they had gotten on so well together, probably why she and Xena got on so well.  

After a tale like that, Xena was afraid to break the silence that had fallen in the Yert, to disturb Aria’s memories. “I think we should go on the assumption that it was Moraga who did this. She has the most motive, and seems to be the only one who had the opportunity to have done it. You said yourself that the warriors are always accompanied when they leave the village, and when they are in the village, most of them are insight of someonelse most of the time right?”.  “Yes, most of the time. We have a great deal of warriors in the village, it’s hard to be alone here”. Aria chuckled, “Talia would complain that she couldn’t even be alone for half a candlemark when she wanted to, and she was the First Warrior. She didn’t really mind though, she’d been raised to be the First Warrior, the way I’d been raised to be Queen someday; we’ve always had guards all our lives since we were born because of our birthrights.  We were used to it, though it can get annoying sometimes”.  

“She always had guards with her?” Xena asked, “Always?” “Yes, always” “Where were the guards when she walked into the Common Yert? I remember her being alone when she came in, and I didn’t see any behind her. Could she have dismissed them before she walked in?”.  “She might have, but even so, they would have been within hearing distance. Kira and Sorianna were always with her, she trusted them completely, she would even walk around in the village sometimes without any weapons at all because she trusted their ability to protect her”. “That is trust” Gabrielle said, “It’s rare to see an Amazon without at least a knife at her side, even in her own village. Even if she can fight without them an amazon always has a weapon with her”.  

“Yes, and Talia was no different. It was usually only when she had just come from her morning swim in the lake and she hadn’t returned to the Yert to get her weapons yet, or she was practicing her wrestling with one of the other warriors in the village. Weapons aren’t permitted on the practice grounds when they’re practicing wrestling; It’s too easy to forget yourself, and pull a weapon to get the upper hand, or to easily get out of an impossible hold”.   

“Is that where she got that cut on her throat?” Xena asked “No, she got that in battle. Viscera had somehow gotten up behind her during a battle and had just gotten the knife in place and started to slice her throat when she elbowed her in the stomach, disarmed her, and killed her. I’m surprised you saw that scar, it’s hard to see unless you know it’s there”.  “Xena sees everything, well, nearly everything” Gabrielle told her. “You said that this Viscera had “gotten up behind her somehow. I take it that means that she was hard to sneak up on from behind even during a battle?”.  

“Yes, Talia was always very aware of her surroundings, always listening to the sounds around her, always aware of who was around her and where they were. She could fight an opponent in front of her, sense another one coming at her from behind, and take her on, and end up defeating them both. I even saw her duck an arrow coming at her from behind once during a battle, it hit the amazon she was fighting; I don’t know how she did it, but she did”.   

The minute she said that, the meaning of what she had just said hit Aria, it hit Xena and Gabrielle at about the same time too, and they exchanged looks with each other and then Aria. It was Gabrielle who said what they were all thinking.  “But if she could do that, then why didn’t she duck the arrow coming at her that day? Unless she was too distracted to realize it”. “No, anyone who can catch, duck, or deflect an arrow coming at them from behind is never too distracted to sense it. She didn’t duck on purpose Gabrielle” Xena said, staring straight ahead, replaying the incident in her memory.  

 “What? Why?” “Because she was protecting me, I was sitting right in front of her that day. She had no way of knowing if that arrow was meant of her or not that day, but she knew that if she ducked it, I would get hit by it”.  “But you can catch arrows” “But she either didn’t know that or didn’t want to take the chance of me having time to catch it after it passed her if she’d ducked. But I doubt it would have mattered either way. Talia took that arrow on purpose Gabrielle, she sacrificed her life to save mine even though she barely knew me”.  Gabrielle was speechless, though it didn’t surprise her. Talia had been an Amazon, for an Amazon to do such a thing, even for a stranger, was not unusual.  

Xena remembered how Talia had met her eyes with her own just before her head dropped to the table and she lost consciousness, now she understood why.  “I have to avenge her death Gabrielle so that she can cross over in peace. I swear to you Talia, I will find your killer, and she’ll pay for it by Amazon law”.