With a big grin, Gabrielle grabbed Xena’s waiting hand and in less than a heartbeat was up behind Xena on the horse. Xena clicked the horse with her heels and they were off.

It was getting close to midday when both Xena and Gabrielle sensed something somewhere wasn’t right. Xena stopped the horse to better hear.  She and Gabrielle realized at the same time what it was.

“The village!” Xena exclaimed. “I hear horses and the sounds of women and children screaming.”

“You’re right! Sounds like it’s under attack!”

Without giving it a second thought, Gabrielle threw the deer to the ground as Xena kicked her horse in the flanks with her heels, urging it into a distance-eating gallop. The closer they got, the better they could hear the sounds of battle – men yelling as they fought, women and children screaming and crying.

Arriving at the edge of the village, Xena slowed only long enough for Gabrielle to jump off, then whipped her horse into the thick of the fighting. The townspeople were trying their best, but most were armed only with shovels, rakes, pitchforks or axes. Only a very few had swords or pikes. They were no match for the well-armed, and armored, warriors.

Xena flipped off the front of her horse as it came to an immediate stop. Her Chakram was singing its way toward several mounted spearmen, lopping off the iron blades from the shafts before returning to her.

As she landed, sword drawn, she yelled back at Gabrielle to protect, and to lead to safety, the children and women.

Gabrielle, sais drawn, battled through foot soldiers until she was at an old building where they had taken refuge. But the thatched roof was on fire, and large chunks of burning thatch were falling off.

“Is there somewhere away from here? Somewhere safe?” she shouted at an old woman.

“Into the woods!” she shouted back. “A long way off there is a cave. I think I remember the way.”

Gabrielle nodded, then began to issue orders to the ten or fifteen womena nd children who were huddled in the farthest part of the building.  She convinced them to follow her out of the front, and only door.  And as the old woman led them and into the woods, Gabrielle stayed behind to protect the rear. She discovered she could better fight the warriors who tried to pursue them by using a spear she found as a battle staff.

The last soldier managed to avoid the staff and tried grabbing at her with one hand, ready to run her through with his short sword. But as Gabrielle instinctively jerked backward, his hand closed around the pendant necklace Xena had given her for her birthday a half-year before.  As the silver chain broke, Gabrielle went to one knee, smoothly drew her sais, and plunged them both into the man’s belly.

As he died, he fell forward onto his face, the hand with Gabrielle’s pendant underneath him. Gabrielle started to turn him over to retrieve it, but out of the corner of her eye she sa
w two more soldiers had gotten past her and were chasing the  group of refugees. Putting her sais back into the leather loops on either side of her ankles, she picked up the spear and ran after them. She would have to come back later for her pendant.

With Xena’s help, the tide was slowly turning back in favor of the townspeople, but still too many were being wounded and killed. As she fought, she kept looking for the warlord or general in charge, anyone who might be leading them. If she could take him out, it might demoralize the rest of the soldiers. But they all were dressed the same. And she didn’t recognize the armor or the weapons they used.

Just when she thought she and the villagers were winning, volley after volley of fire-tipped arrows began to rain down on them all. Some of the arrows were hitting the very soldiers she was fighting.

But the worst of it was that so many of the huts and cabins were beginning to burn. And the heat of the conflagration was causing an influx of swiftly moving air, and the fires roared higher and with more ferocity until the only alternative was to evacuate the town.

The uncontrollable raging fires incinerated everything and everyone left behind.

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