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Chapter Text

~5 years before the events in ABP~

      “I ain’t no thief!” came the high-pitched, indignant squeal from outside the tent.

      Sergeant Eldest of the Queen’s Own Rangers (22^nd Shiloh) looked up, searching for the source of the commotion. “I didn’t steal it!” came another high-pitched protest just before Corporal Meg frog-marched the little river-rat into her presence. Eldest looked and saw all too familiar a tale: a hard-faced, waiflike girl in rough homespun shirt and trousers, unkempt, dirty and ill-fed. Only two things set this particular rat apart from the countless others she’d seen in her day- a shock of blonde hair almost like spun gold, and a large ripe red apple, clutched protectively in a vicelike grip.

      “What’s this, Corporal?” Eldest asked Meg, though she already knew the answer. It wasn’t as if they hadn’t already acted this particular scene a hundred times before.

      “Another rat,” growled Meg. “Filching from supplies.”

      “I didn’t steal nothin’!” wailed the girl, twisting in Meg’s grip, almost wrenching free before Meg got her under control by the simple expedient of grabbing a fistful of golden hair with her free hand. Though short, the girl’s hair was raggedly cut, with a knife instead of shears. “I found it, lyin’ on the ground! Someone must ‘ave dropped it, or it fell off a cart, belike!”

      The accent was pure river trash.

      “I’m sure it did, because apples grow on the ground like potatoes,” Meg growled sarcastically. “Now give me that!” Meg tried to prise it out of girl’s grip, but the little rat curled around it desperately, hedgehog style.

      “No! Mine! Finders keepers!”

      Eldest sighed and signaled Meg to desist before farce turned into outright tragedy. “On the ground or in a barrel, it’s still an Army apple,” she snarled. “If you want to eat Army food you can bloody well enlist!”

      “I tried!” the girl hollered back through tears, clutching the apple like it was life itself. “I told them I were over sixteen, they didn’t believe me, said to come back when I was showing some tits!”

      If this little savage was sixteen, Eldest was the Queen Mother. Of course, girls, particularly hungry ones, lied about their ages and the recruiters looked the other way, especially in wartime. But this was peacetime and yes, this little rat hadn’t even the hint of tits to back up her claims. She looked nine or ten. It was true malnutrition stunted the growth of the river trash… But not this much.

      She sighed wearily. “Six lashes for filching, Meg,” she told her corporal. “And don’t go easy on her. She can keep the apple though, no one will want it out of her grubby paws.” 

      They’d been through this a hundred times before. You had to go through the motions. The gutter rats stole, and you had to whup them when you caught them, because the Army couldn’t feed every gutter rat in the land, even when her heart went out to them. Of course, there were ways. Her instruction to Meg not to take it easy on the girl was in fact a command to do the exact opposite. After all, it was only one lousy apple. But you still had to go through the motions. The gutter rats knew it just as well as they did.

      “I’m letting you off easy this time, rat,” she warned. “If you’re caught again, I’ll have skin off your hide.”

      Meg grabbed the quirt and yanked the shirt off the waif despite her howls of protest, but then froze. Someone had already whipped the girl, and far worse than any Army punishment for filching. But that wasn’t the worst of it. On the girl’s shoulder was a brand Eldest recognized, the angular “B” of the Bozes, upcountry cattle barons.

      A year or so ago, her troop had been deployed north, to help put down a rash of cattle thefts. She remembered Carol Boze quite well and still shuddered at the memory. To call the Bozes greedy, mean, hard-handed bitches would be an exceedingly kind compliment and Carol Boze was the worst of the lot, setting the tone for sisters just as ugly and mean as she. Axe-faced, sun-withered, thin and cruel as a rawhide whip, Eldest loathed the woman from the first day of the deployment. Despite the fact the Army -and her Rangers especially- were there to help, it was never enough for Carol Boze. She still remembered having to keep a serene, professional face while Boze screamed invectives at her, as if she was personally responsible for the rustlers. And then she had the gall to demand the Rangers pay her grazing fees for their horses.

      Strangely, her Rangers had never managed to catch a single rustler the whole time they were deployed.

      “Sooo…” Eldest breathed, rising to get a better look. “This isn’t the first time you’ve been caught filching, has it?”

      Pure defiance greeted her in the girl’s gaze. “I ain’t never stolen nothin’ from nobody”.

      “Why the whip marks then, girl?” Eldest demanded. The most recent of them looked perhaps a few months old, others crisscrossing her torso older than that. 

      The girl hesitated, then seemed to come to some decision. “The Bozes, upcountry, they stole somethin’ from my mamma, I was jus’ tryin’ to git it back.”

      “And the brand?”

      The girl swallowed a sob. “I reckon that was Carol Boze’s way of sayin’ she was gonna keep what she stole.”

      “And what was it she stole?” Eldest asked, curious.

      The golden-haired girl looked down. “It don’t matter now. My mamma, she’s dead.”

      It was the way she said it, with such quiet dignity, that touched her. Eldest crouched low on her haunches, to look the waif in the eye. “They say you can tell a lot about a person by the quality of their friends… and their enemies. It happens I met Carol Boze a while back and didn’t much care for her. What’s your name, girl?”

      Wary blue eyes met hers, the color of fine china, lip trembling. She looked down at her treasure, then back to Eldest. “Apple,” she said finally. “My name’s Apple.”

      Eldest chuckled at the obvious lie. “Well, at least it isn’t Smith or Jones.” She sighed and rose, taking a few tins of rations from her footlocker, passing them to the girl, who looked at her with wide, disbelieving eyes. “I guess you earned that apple. Finders keepers.” She nodded to Meg, to return the waif’s shirt. “Good luck. Stay away from soldier’s camps. They’re no place for a little one like you.”

      The girl stared at her a few long moments, then dashed out of the tent, leaving her alone with Meg, who rewarded her with a sour look. “That just encourages more theft, you know.”

      “I know, I know,” Eldest sighed. “But any girl who can spit in the Boze’s eyes can’t be all bad. Besides, it was only one lousy apple and few tins of rations. Small enough.”

      “I suppose so,” was Meg’s doubtful reply as she left.

      Eldest sighed and turned back to her paper, a four-day-old copy of the Herald, the crass headline proclaiming “First Anniversary of the Durham Theater Bombing- Perpetrators still at large- Does incompetence reign in Queensland?”

Chapter Text

      Reveille sounded next morning like the lowing of a mournful cow. Eldest filled the morning roster while Meg ran the muster. Exiting her tent, she received the morning report and a wry look from her corporal. “Sixteen Rangers present and accounted for. But I’m afraid we’ve got a bad Apple in the lot.”

      “A bad apple?”

      “A disobedient one to be sure, Sergeant. You did tell her to stay away from soldier’s camps.”

      She looked over to the muster line. At the end was their visitor of the night before. Her ragged mop of golden hair was shining in the morning sun and she stood stiffly at attention with the rest of the troop. A tin paint bucket hung like a drum in front of her, suspended by coarse haybale twine looped around her neck. She held two polished wooden sticks in the position of “carry arms”, mimicking the position the women held their carbines in. It was all Eldest could do not to burst out laughing. Shorter by half than the rest of the troop, grubby-faced, clad in the poorest of threadbare, cast-off clothing with ragged hair, bare feet, and a ‘drum’ made of a paint can, the little urchin made a picture of perfect comedy. But somehow, the set of her jaw and the determination in her eye lent her dignity.

      “Well…” Eldest drawled, “I suppose one bad Apple doesn’t spoil the whole lot.” She marched over to the troop and fetched up before the girl. “And just what the hell do you think you’re doing?” she growled in her best sergeant’s voice.

      “Drummer girl Apple reportin’ for duty, ma'am!” the waif snapped out in a clear soprano.

      “I don’t need disobedient soldiers, rat. I told you to stay away from soldiers camps!”

      “Beggin’ your pardon, ma'am, you told me that if I wanted to eat Army food I should join the Army. You gave me rations yourself, ma'am. I earn my keep ma'am!”

      “Don't go calling me 'ma'am', I work for a living," growled Eldest. "You’re too young. Come back when you’re showing tits like they told you!”

      “Soldiers are sixteen. Drummer-girls can be any age!”

      Suppressed snickers echoed down the line. Eldest frowned. This was amusing, but enough was enough. “Do you even know how to play a drum, girl?” she demanded.

      With perfect precision, the girl presented her drumsticks and tapped out a tinny but otherwise very credible ‘long roll’, followed by ‘slow march’, ‘quick march’ and ‘assemble’.

      “I kin play the bugle too, but I don’t have one,” she confessed.

      Eldest clenched her jaw. Yes, other regiments had underage drummer girls. But not the 22^nd. And they were Queen’s own Mounted Rangers, to boot. Though now that she thought on it, that was one way to be rid of the little guttersnipe…

      “Tell me, ‘Apple’, can you ride a horse?” she asked archly. Most river-trash couldn’t. If they were wealthy enough to own a horse, they wouldn’t be river trash.

      That strong jaw set as the little girl nodded. “My mamma, she was a stockwoman and drover. She lived in the saddle, tamed horses, and she taught me all there is to know about ‘em. I rode before I could walk!”

      Eldest winced inside, though she kept her face impassive. The gutter rat could play the drum and claimed to be able to ride a horse. Eldest was running out of excuses. But then, that was an opportunity in itself. She nodded somberly. “You seem a little young to know everything about horses.”

      Pride flared in those eyes, pure spirit. “I ride better’n I can walk and I walk just fine!”

      Amused despite herself, Eldest chuckled. “Is that so? Well that’s a good thing. We’re Queen’s Rangers, attached as scouts to the 22^nd Shiloh Infantry. While the hikers walk, we ride.”

      “I ride good as any, and better’n most!”

      “So you say,” replied Eldest, allowing doubt to edge her voice. “I, however, require proof. There’s a horse in our line that can be a mite skittish. But I’m sure he wouldn’t be much trouble for a stockwoman’s daughter. You ride him once around the perimeter of the camp, my troop and the 22nd will take you on as a drummer-girl. You get thrown, you head back to whatever river camp you came from.”

      The girl considered. “Fair enough. But I git an honest chance ridin’ this buck, no fair settin’ me up t’fail, someone else rilin’ him up first, or sticking burrs under the saddle!”

      “Done,” Eldest smiled, closing her trap. “Shake on it.” She offered her hand, which the girl gravely took and shook.

      She turned to the troop. “Dismissed until midmorning maneuvers. Be saddled and ready to ride at ten-hundred.”  She turned back and pointed to their little drummer. “You, come with me.”

      They set out for the horse-lines, she and Meg leading, Apple trailing behind- along with half the troop, chatting with Nan. Eldest scowled. Just how did this particular gutter whelp find out about drummer-girls anyway?

      “I do believe,” she murmured to Meg, “that some of our girls are consorting with the enemy.”

      “It does look like that,” Meg admitted. “It’s too bad she isn’t of age… She’s got a spirit to her. Which horse were you thinking of trying her out on? Nightfall?”

      “No, I was thinking of setting her on that remount the colonel’s offered to whoever can ride him. What’s his name? Jasper?”

      Meg looked more than a little appalled. “Are you trying to kill her? What’s the score on that horse? Three broken arms, one broken leg, a couple of concussions, and more cracked ribs than anyone can count?”

      “If she’s as good as she says she is, she shouldn't be too badly hurt when she's thrown. If she’s not as good… Well, best we find out now. And either way she goes back to the river where she belongs.”

      Meg scowled but said nothing until they were at the corral. As it happened, there was already a lieutenant trying her own luck with the gelding. A small crowd of onlookers were gathered, shouting encouragement and good-natured ribbing. Apple clambered up the three-rail fence of the corral and popped up beside her. “What a beauty!” she exclaimed. “Thoroughbred blood in him for sure!”

      Eldest could only nod and agree. A rich chestnut with black mane, tail and socks, he was a splendid animal. “That’s Jasper. Thoroughbred and Quarterhorse cross. He’s halter broke and supposedly hunter-trained. The Colonel bought him at auction and wondered why the price was so low. He’s a mite skittish…”

      The words were scarce out of her mouth before the lieutenant started to throw a leg over the gelding’s back, only to have him rear and bolt before she could settle herself, almost getting a boot caught in the stirrup. Down she went in a cloud of dust, but rolled quickly back out of the way, showing she wasn’t hurt.

      “Ay-yup, that’s a skittish horse a’right.” Apple drawled as Jasper trotted away, tail bannering in triumph as two troopers tried to corner him. “Hunter-trained?” she asked, eyes narrowed, following the horse’s movements.

      “Supposedly,” Eldest nodded. “Not that you’d notice.” She turned to the girl. “Having second thoughts?”

      “Not at all,” the girl scoffed. “I’m jus’ a mite surprised, is all. The way you talked about this buck, I thought this were going to be difficult.”

      “Is that a fact?” asked Eldest, trying not to laugh. “Well then, surely you won’t mind going in there and showing us all how it’s done then.”

      Apple gave one shake of her golden head. “Nope, he’s too riled,” she nodded to where four women were now trying to catch his dangling reins. “Ain’t no one going to ride him now. You git me first ride tomorrow, right after sunup, an I’ll ride him wherever you like.”

      “I’ll hold you to that, girl,” Eldest warned her, but nonetheless she went over to the stable governess to see it done. When she came back to where Meg stood, however, their visitor was gone. She raised a brow to Meg. “Didn't we have a rotten little Apple here a moment ago?”

      “We did,” Meg agreed. “She went off with Nan and Hope, though.”

      “Nan *and* Hope?” Eldest shuddered. Nan had a strong sense of justice and a stubborn streak a mile wide. Hope was the sort to mother every stray kitten and chipmunk that crossed her path. They were good soldiers, but between the two they managed to provide most of the drama in her Troop. She sighed. There was no way this was going to go according to her liking. The only question was going to be how far off from her liking things would be.

Chapter Text

      It wasn’t a small crowd that gathered by the corral the next morning, it was a large one. Her own troop, of course, but it seemed like half the camp was there as well. Pushing her way through the throng her heart sank as she saw Colonel Wellsbury herself, granddaughter of the famous General from the War of False Eldest. She steeled herself. Nothing to do now but bull her way through. On the positive side, what she didn’t see was their little drummer girl. Hopefully she’d had second thoughts and was back at whatever river camp she’d spawned from.

      “Great Hera’s teat, Sergeant, are you Rangers recruiting infants, now?” came the Colonel’s booming voice, troopers in the crowd magically parting as the tall woman strode up to the paddock alongside Eldest.

      “Ma’am?” Eldest snapped her a salute, confused.

      Wordlessly, the Colonel nodded to where Nan was leading Jasper, bridled but unsaddled, into the ring. Little Apple trotted behind, carrying a wooden soap-box while Hope brought up the rear, carrying a saddle and blanket.

      Eldest scowled at the two. There was some punishment in the Military Code for fraternizing with the enemy, she had to look it up. “Colonel, Ma’am, no, ma’am” she replied. “We’re merely evaluating a potential candidate for a drummer girl.”

      “Drummer girl? What in Hera’s name would Rangers want with a drummer girl?”

      “She plays the bugle too, ma’am, or so I’m told,” said Eldest defensively, hoping now it were true.

      “A bugler? Why didn’t you say so?! I can’t do anything with my Blackberry, she makes reveille sound like a lovesick cow in labor.”

      “Ah, maybe we should find out if the girl can ride first, ma’am?”

      “Ride?” The Colonel’s eyes widened. “You’re putting that bit of dandelion fluff on that murdering nag of a Jasper?!” Her tone said everything Meg’s look did yesterday, and more.

      Put that way, perhaps this wasn’t her wisest decision, but nothing to do now but bull through. “We Rangers have standards, Ma’am”, she said simply, and turned to watch the little tableaux in the ring.

      Nan held Jasper’s reins while Apple arranged the soap-box beside the horse, then she nickered to the beast, offering him a sugar-cube flat-palmed, which he eagerly took. With that, she then clambered up the soapbox to stand atop it while Hope handed her first the blanket, then the saddle.

      Eldest’s eyes narrowed. The saddle wasn’t the standard military pattern. It was a simple hunt saddle, which was to say about as minimal a saddle as one could get. From the murmurs in the crowd, others had noticed the change as well, and behind her she heard bets being exchanged.

      Watching them, one thing was clear… Apple hadn’t been lying about knowing horses. She had the gelding saddled and cinched with an efficiency any of her troopers might have envied. So efficiently, in fact, that she finished while Jasper was still enjoying the taste of the sugar, a bit of horse-drool dripping down from velvet lips.

      An expectant hush fell over the throng, watching as Apple slipped a bare, dirty foot into the stirrup. Then with one easy, practiced motion she swung up and over, settling herself into the saddle, the stirrups so high as to be comical. A groan went through the crowd, awaiting a repeat of the day before… but Jasper placidly stood there while Nan handed Apple the reins.     

      ‘Of course he’s just standing there,’ Eldest thought in appalled realization. ‘She’s so light he probably doesn’t even realize he’s got a rider aboard.’ But then Apple tapped gently with her heels and Jasper did a quick trot around the ring. It wasn’t even like watching a jockey ride a racehorse. More like watching a tow-haired cocklebur stuck on Jasper’s back.

      “That’ll do!” cried the Colonel, but Apple was already calling to Hope to open the gate, and together horse and rider thundered out of the ring, to the horrified cries of the onlookers.

      Jasper’s stride lengthened to a ground-eating canter that was almost a gallop as Eldest watched, heart in her throat. Apple thundered the horse down the sentry path around the camp, scattering the firewatch in her wake. Groans sounded as she approached the first corner of their roughly square encampment, but Jasper took the turn without protest, a neat corner his Quarterhorse dam would be proud of, then lengthened the canter into a true gallop down the straightaway. “Holy mothers!” whispered one woman beside her, fumbling her pocket watch out to time them. Apple leaned to the side and expertly slowed Jasper to take the next corner, then gave him his head again, sliding from canter to gallop down the straightaway again. Two more corners flashed by and cheers all around them rose as Apple guided the lathered horse back to the corral, waving at her admirers as Hope fastened the gate behind them.

      Eldest vaulted the railings, walking over to the soapbox as Apple guided Jasper over to dismount. There she scowled up at the grinning, golden-haired girl. “How?” she demanded.

      Apple grinned and gave her an insouciant look. “Why Sergeant, didn’t you know? Horses like Apples.” She tossed the reins to Nan, then slid down Jasper’s flank to the soapbox.

      “Sergeant Eldest Ranger!” came the Colonel’s booming voice as the tall woman strode up. She towered over both Eldest and Apple, glowering down at both of them. Apple, still standing on the soapbox, looked at the great woman with awe. Then she stood up straight and, with perfect dignity, saluted.

      The Colonel’s jaw went rigid and Eldest inwardly quailed… then realized the Colonel was desperately trying not to laugh. “Young miss,” she growled. “Just what was that… display… around the camp intended to prove?”

      “Why Colonel,” Apple piped, “Sergeant here said she’d take me on as drummer-girl iff’n I rode that skittish horse around the camp. So I did.”

      “I… see,” Wellsbury drawled. She glanced off to Eldest, who came to attention. “Sergeant Eldest?”

      “Yes, ma’am!” Eldest replied, curt and military.

      “Is that about the truth of it?”

      Eldest winced inside, but put the best face on it she could. “Those were my words, ma’am.”

      “I see.” The Colonel paused and considered, eyes flicking over the waiflike Apple.

      “Sergeant,” she said at last. “Your drummer-girl is out of uniform. I expect better of Queen’s Rangers. Correct that, please.”

      “Ma’am, yes, ma’am!” Eldest acknowledged. One did not argue with the Colonel.

      Eldest watched as the Colonel waded out through the thinning crowd then turned to the grinning girl and sighed. “Welcome to the Troop, Apple. Go see that Jasper is walked until cool, cleaned up and watered after that run. I’m sure I don’t have to tell you to see that he doesn’t drink too much, nor the water be too cold. And send Hope to me.”

      Hope arrived, wearing her best wide-eyed innocent expression, magnified by her wire-rim spectacles. Eldest gave her a wintery smile. “Trooper Hope, the more innocent you look, the more guilty I know you are. Spill. How did Apple just ride the most unrideable horse in the whole regiment?”

      “It’s certainly a mystery, Sergeant,” Hope replied primly. “She said the saddle was probably most of the problem. Apparently the standard issue saddles have a tendency to be broad and Jasper has a narrow back. It wouldn’t feel right to him. I also know she slept in the stall with him last night, to get him used to her scent. She claims to know the Horsewoman’s Word, passed down from her mother. Perhaps it’s not just a superstition after all.”

      Eldest raised brows. “An actual Horsewoman? Really?”

      “So she says, Sergeant.”

      Eldest looked off to the horizon. “So you don’t know of any other… Methods? That might she might have used?”

      “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean, Sergeant,” Hope replied, looking especially innocent. “But that reminds me, the troop medicine chest is low on laudanum, I need your authorization to draw more from the regimental dispensary.”

      Eldest gave Hope a withering stare, but it was wasted effort; Hope practiced her stares on cats. Finally Eldest threw up her hands in surrender. “Fine. You’re excused from midmorning maneuvers. Instead, you take that little stray of yours down to Supply and see what they can come up with in the way of a uniform and other gear. Get her a bath, too, while you’re at it. Then report back to me.”

      Hope smiled. “A pleasure. But don’t go calling her *my* little stray. You’re the one that fed her. Apples cling close to the tree that nourishes them. That little stray is yours.”

      In the Army there were not a lot of times a subordinate got to chew out a superior and get away with it, but Eldest knew she didn’t have a reply to that. Sighing, she turned back to the day’s duties.

      The day’s maneuvers and the minutiae of military life kept her occupied until the time of evening mess rolled around. In the field the commissary would simply issue rations and each troop cooked over their own fire, but in an established camp they ate at the company mess tent. It was just coming time to the mess call when Hope appeared outside her tent, asking admittance.

      “Come,” Eldest called to her, gratefully looking up from dreary paperwork.

      “Apple’s ready for inspection, Sergeant… and before you ask, yes, this is the smallest uniform we could find for her, and the regimental tailor cut *that* down to fit.”

      Eldest smiled. “That bad, eh?”

      Hope gave her a pained look. “I’m sure she’ll grow into it… eventually.”

      Eldest rose and strode outside the tent, where Apple stood. “Ten-hut!” barked Hope, and the girl came to attention, standing smartly. They’d dressed her in the typical army-blue sack-coat and pants, all of which looked at least a size too big on her, closer to two. She could also see where the tailors had altered the sleeves and trouser legs, taking them in. They’d cut down a belt to fit her but there was nothing to be done about the large rectangular brass belt buckle, sized to fit an adult. The full-sized buckle just served to emphasize how undersized everything else was. The cap, at least, fit, and the boots were only a size too large. Apple must have large feet for her frame, and be wearing winter socks as well. She looked like some soldier’s daughter, trying on her mother’s uniform for fun.  Eldest wanted to laugh, but again, Apple’s dignity checked the impulse. She stood so still and proud it was impossible to make fun of her, even in jest.

      “The belt buckle is bigger than the girl,” she murmured to Hope, out of Apple’s earshot.

      “If you think that’s bad, wait until you see the drum they found her,” Hope whispered back.

      “If it’s a regimental drum, I can picture it already.”

      Eldest strode up to Apple with a curt “At ease,” giving her a look-over. Well, she couldn’t chew her out for an ill-fitting uniform when that was the best-fitting uniform they could cobble together. “I understand they issued you a drum?” she asked.

      Apple bounced with enthusiasm. “Yes, Sergeant! It’s in my tent.”

      “Your tent?”

      “We’re full strength,” Hope explained. “Two women to a tent, except for you and the corporal. So there’s no place to put her. Besides, there’s apparently a regulation forbidding drummer girls and regular troopers to share a tent. To discourage, ah, exploitation. But they had an extra of those little ammunition tents, and she fits perfectly.”

      Eldest looked across the neat row of wedge tents that defined her troop and saw a new one in the line; a little half-sized wedge of brown canvas, just big enough to shelter three full-sized ammunition lockers- or one half-sized drummer girl. Looking from the girl to the tent to the rest of the encampment, Eldest gave a rueful shake of her head. Sometimes, you just had to let things go and let them sort themselves out on their own. “Well done, Trooper Hope; I’m sure she’ll be a credit to the 22^nd Shiloh and the Queen’s Rangers.”

      “Thank you Sergeant,” Hope beamed. “I’m sure she will.”

      Eldest frowned, looking back at the encampment, something she’d seen niggling at her mind. “While you were at Supply, did you get any word on why they’re bringing up so much transport?” She gestured with her chin to the distant supply tents, now surrounded with wagons.

      “It’s probably the secret orders,” Apple piped up.

      Eldest glanced down. “Secret orders? What secret orders?” she demanded.

      “The ones on Major Kiverly’s desk over in the supply tent,” Apple told her earnestly. “The 22nd is pulling up stakes and being sent west to the Blue Dagger river on the Imomain border.”

      “Apple!” growled Eldest, aghast. “You do not *ever* invade the privacy of an officer’s desk!”

      “But I didn’t!” protested Apple, bewildered. “They were just sitting right there open on the desktop. They can’t be *that* secret if she left them like that, can they?”

      “How did you- You can read?”

      “Of course I can read! My mamma, she taught me.” Apple looked afraid, suddenly terrified. “I… I didn’t mean to do wrong. I won’t tell anyone, I swear!”

      “Shh, shh,” Eldest made a quelling motion with her hand. “It’s all right. There are no secrets in a war camp, not for long. But I wouldn’t go boasting about this, either. Can you keep a secret?”

      Apple relaxed a little and gave her a wan smile. “Oh yes. If there’s one thing my mamma taught me, it was how to keep secrets.”

      Eldest grunted. “See that you do- from the rest of the regiment. Your Troop, however, is a different matter. The first and most important job of a Queen’s Ranger is to gather information. So in the future you bring anything like this you learn straight to me. Clear?"

      "Clear, Sergeant!"

      "Good. Dismissed.”

      Apple braced to attention happily. “Yes, Sergeant!” and headed off to her tent.

      Eldest watched Apple head off, and turned to Hope. “Well? What do you think, having gotten to know her a little better?”

      Hope furrowed her brow in thought. “I think our Apple may be a little green, but there’s more to her than meets the eye. She *looks* like a river trash urchin, and mostly sounds like one too… but she acts almost well-bred.”

      “How so?” asked Eldest.

      “Well, she insisted on bathing in private when we got that far. Quoted me chapter and verse from the Holy Book on how the gods love modesty and hate ostentation. Quoted the chapter and verse correctly, by the way. Changed in private too, when we were trying on uniforms. I was going to bring up something else, but you already discovered it. The drum they issued her is Title-A gear.”

      “So?” asked Eldest.

      “So, you have to sign for Title-A gear.”

      “And…?”

      “And she did. With as neat a signature as you could ask for. Signed herself as ‘Apple Drover’. She didn’t just make a mark like the illiterate river trash do.”

      “So she writes as well as reads.”

      “She reads and writes *well*, Sergeant. She may sound like river trash, but I think that’s a put-on. When she’s tired or distracted her speech clears right up.” Hope frowned. “Like just now.”

      “So her mother was likely an outcast from a well-to-do family, not a river trash singleton.”

      “That would be my guess.”

      Eldest mulled it over, then gave a shrug. “How well or how poorly she was born, it makes no matter on whether she can make a good soldier or not. It’s just as well she’s a drummer girl, she’s too small for anything else.”

      “So you say. You didn’t hear her badgering the supply sergeant to be issued a musket, or at least a pistol.”

      Eldest chuckled. “Her trying to lift a Brown Betsy? I’d pay a quince to see that.”

      “That’s what Keva at Supply said. Apple now has a new quince.”

      “She lifted a Brown Betsy? The musket would be taller than she is!”

      “Lifted it, shouldered it, did a credible Order, Present and Port arms too. Then she gave Keva a lecture on how muzzle-loaders were obsolete and the regiment needed modern arms like the Wainwright or Henrietta 44s.”

      Eldest could picture it. “Did Keva smack her?”

      “She was too busy laughing.”

      Eldest scowled. “Being small and cute will only get her so far. See if you can’t teach her better manners.”

      “Yes, Sergeant. Of course,” Hope trailed, “that doesn’t change the fact that she’s right.”

      “Oh don’t you start too. It’s not just the expense of outfitting an entire army with costly rifles, the women in Supply are fighting it too. Multiple shots just encourage women to waste ammunition, and supply has enough trouble keeping the guns fed as it is.”

      “I suppose,” said Hope doubtfully. “But I still wouldn’t care to face a repeating rifle in the field with a muzzle-loader.”

      “That’s what revolvers are for,” acknowledged Eldest. She looked to the sun, settling on the horizon, and decided it was time. “Drummer-Girl Apple!” she bellowed.

      “Yes, Sergeant!” came the reply from over by the tents.

      “Assemble the troop! Sound muster!”

      “Ay-yup!” came the cheerful reply.

      Eldest had to admit that the tattoo of the drum seemed to put an extra spring in the troop’s step as they assembled. Once the mournful notes of the evening mess call sounded they set off for the company mess tent, the two patrols of the troop marching in column behind them. That left Apple as the odd girl out, so she marched at Eldest’s side, scowling. “She needs to use her lips more,” she complained of the bugle notes. “Mess isn’t supposed to sound like a funeral call.”

      “Clearly you’ve never eaten at the 7th Company mess before,” Eldest told her ruefully. “A funeral dirge is often appropriate. How did you learn to play the drum, anyway?”

      “Oh, my mamma taught me that.”

      “Your mamma sounds like quite a woman. Taught you how to read, how to ride, play a drum…”

      Apple’s eyes filled with tears as they walked. “She was the best mamma,” she choked.

      “What happened to her?” Eldest asked, curious.

      Apple looked down at her feet. “It don’t matter now. She’s dead.”

      “It matters to you, doesn’t it?”

      “It don’t matter now,” Apple repeated dully.

      “Fair enough,” Eldest replied, forbearing to press what was clearly private. They walked in silence a while, until she thought of another tack to take. “What about your father?”

      Apple brightened a little at that. “Oh, I don’t have one. Mamma used to say she bought me for ten crowns from a passing stork.”

      Eldest chuckled. “Did she now?”

      “Ay-yup. She always used to say if she ever found that stork again, she’d demand five crowns back on account of I was powerful stubborn- then offer the stork a thousand crowns for another jus’ like me," she beamed, love and affection touching her every word.

      Eldest considered. The ten crowns was a pretty clear indication Apple had been fathered out of a crib, hardly unusual. Still, most crib babies knew their father’s names, or at least the crib name and his number. “She never told you anything more?” she asked.

      Apple shook her head. “Naw. Sometimes she’d change the story a little, jus’ for fun. She’d say she found me in the half-price bin at a mercantile, other times she’d say she won me at a card game with a red-headed elf.”

      “A red-headed elf? Surely you mean gold, with your hair.”

      “Nope. It was always a red-headed elf, though sometimes the game was darts, or chess, or even whisky shots.”

Chapter Text

      They marched into the mess, standing behind the benches at the table, standing as the company Chaplin led the blessings, then seated as each table in turn went to the chow line. Apple ended up seated by her, just by reason of their marching order. While they waited their turn, she leaned over to whisper;

      "The mess hall sign said 7th company, are we 7th company too?"

      Eldest shook her head. "It's more like we're guests of the 7th company. In theory there's one and only one regiment of Rangers in the Queen's army, but I don't think the entire regiment has ever been assembled in one place. Instead we're parceled out, mostly as troops but sometimes in files and columns, to act as scouts for regular army units. Officially, we're 1st Regiment, Queen's Rangers, Company C, 5th troop. But in practice we're attached to the 22nd Shiloh and under the command of Colonel Wellsbury."

      Apple struggled with the concept. "So which officers do we obey?"

      "In theory, only the Colonel can task us directly. But she's delegated that right to her majors as well. As for the other officers, well, we try to keep them happy as long as their requests are phrased as requests, and not direct orders." Eldest quirked a smile at the girl. "But as a drummer-girl, if an officer gives you an order to jump, you do so and ask how high on the way down."

      Apple nodded, eyes wide. "Yes, Sergeant."

      They were called, and Eldest sighed as she saw what was on offer. There was a large pot of tucker, a mostly-tasteless, greasy sowbelly-and-bean paste, with hardtack and reconstituted dried peas. At least the coffee smelled something like coffee was supposed to, which meant it might contain at least half real coffee.

      “Food,” murmured Apple worshipfully beside her, ladling her new-issue tin bowl to overflowing, stuffing every available pocket with hardtack.

      “Easy,” advised Eldest. “There’s no need to be greedy; and once you taste it, you won’t want to be. Don’t go making yourself sick.”

      “But… It’s food,” said her charge plaintively, glancing longingly back at the chow line as Eldest led her back to the table.

      “There’s plenty, start with what you have.”

      Unlike the other troopers, Apple paused and lowered her head, setting her hands in prayer before tucking into her bowl like a little mill saw, eating so quickly Eldest feared she might choke. “Easy, there drummer-girl. Slow down. It can’t have been that long since you ate, I gave you some rations last night!”

      Apple nodded around a mouthful and swallowed. “And the apple was wonderful! But the littlest Finns were hungry last night, so I gave the rations to them,” she apologized. “They shared with me when I was last hungry, it was only fair.”

      “I see,” murmured Eldest with a twinge of conscience. “Well, go easy anyway. You’ll get tired of it soon enough, no sense hurrying things along.”

      "But... It's *food*," returned Apple puzzledly, scraping her bowl clean. "How do you get tired of food? I reckon it might be improved by some spices, but it's *food*, and not even a little rotted. Still, they really oughta be servin’ somethin' green, or we'll get the bleedy-gums."

      "You're supposed to take an apple to fend off the bleedy-gums."

      Apple's head snapped over to look at her in astonishment. "Apples? Where?"

      Eldest pointed. "In the barrel at the end of the line. Didn't you see them? They're small and you have to cull them for bruises and worms..."

      It was a little like watching a prairie gopher; Apple vanished under the table like a rodent popping down a hole, then she popped up on the other side and scurried over to the barrel, all in a heartbeat.  A moment later she was back, popping up beside Eldest again with three treasures, ripe polished apples. With a look of waiflike bliss she bit into the first while Eldest chuckled.

      "So you really do like apples, hmm?"

      Apple nodded enthusiastically, juice glistening on her chin. "We didn't git many apples on the plains, so we savored 'em when we did. Heaven is where you git to eat apples every day. Hell is when someone steals your apple and eats it in front of you.”

      Eldest laughed. “Is that another thing your mamma taught you?”

      “No,” Apple gave a moue. “Pepper Haybucker taught me that when she stole my apple and ate it in front of me.”

      “No, did she truly?”

      “Ay-yup,” nodded Apple somberly. “A black-hearted girl, that Pepper.”

      “So what did you do?”  

      “Well, that Pepper was a mite older and more’n a mite bigger n’ me, so there wasn’t much I could do about it right then. But I got even next day.”

      “Oh? How so?”

      “Pepper and her sisters noticed I was liken' to claim the best spot for my tentin’, so they’d wait for me to pick a spot, let me clean it up, then they’d claim-jump it. So next evenin’ when we stopped I found an inferno-ant nest and kicked it down level. Takes ‘em a couple hours to dig their way out, and they’re powerful mad when they do. I started pitchin’ my tent and sure enough they shoved me off and pitched their tent right a’top it.” Apple grinned gleefully. “You never did hear such a caterwaulin’ next mornin’!”

      The other troopers had been listening in, and laughter echoed down the table.

      "Stay easy!" came the call from the table nearest the door-flaps. Eldest looked up to see which officer was at the mess, and it was Captain Hawthorne herself, wending her way towards their table. "Sergeant Eldest," the captain greeted her, sliding on to the bench opposite as Becca and Diana moved down to make room and give them some privacy.

      "Captain Hawthorne," acknowledged Eldest. "What can the Queen's Rangers do for you today, ma’am?"

      The Captain grinned. "The usual. What do I always come to you for? What's the first job of a Queen's Ranger?"

      Eldest looked to Apple. "Well, Drummer-girl Apple, what *is* the first job a Queen's Ranger?"

      Apple didn't even need to think. "To gather information, Sergeant!" she said crisply.

      "Just so," said the Captain judiciously. "There's enough wagons coming in to Supply to move half the regiment. Any word on where?"

      Eldest considered. The news on 'where' would be out by the morning at the latest, probably no later than tonight. There were simply too many people that had to be told to keep their destination any kind of a secret. Captain Hawthorne was a good officer, she had a legitimate reason to know, and Queen's Rangers did have a reputation to uphold. She leaned forward. "Nothing's confirmed, but were I to guess, I'd say the Imomain border."

      "The border?" mused the captain. "That makes no sense. It'd throw all the summer relief schedules into chaos... Unless there’s trouble on the border we don’t know about.”

      Eldest shrugged. “There’s always some Immomain princess coming of age, and you know what they’re like.”

      Captain Hawthorne grunted her agreement, caressing her chin in thought.  Eldest finished her meal while the Captain contemplated, but towards the end Apple could contain herself no longer, leaned over and whispered, “Sergeant Eldest? Uh, what *are* Imomain princesses like?”

      Captain Hawthorne looked up from her thoughts. “Imomains inherit different from us Queenslanders,” she explained. “Eldest daughter isn’t automatically the head of family. Instead, it’s whoever the senior females of the line decide is ‘fittest’ or most successful. Supposedly this ensures the most competent female heads the line, but in practice, it makes their court a snake-pit of warring, ambitious princesses all looking to impress their grandmothers or remove rivals. Personally, I think the Queensland way is far better. They may not have had a Queen Titia, but we’ve never had an Empress Isabella the Executioner either.”

      “Queen Cida came close, though,” murmured Eldest.

      Captain Hawthorne shook her head. “Yes and no. That was one set of executions, yes, but they were swift, merciful and you could argue, necessary. What else are you going to do with traitor’s blood? Can you imagine if even a single female of the False Eldest’s line had escaped? We’d be fighting with the War of the False Eldest every generation, bloodshed without end. Better to have it done all in one afternoon. Besides, Queen Isabella killed more in a single morning before breakfast and,” she swallowed, “The executions were anything but clean.   

      “So yes,” the Captain continued. “A new princess, chip on her shoulder and anxious to prove herself worthy of her rank and a husband… That could spell trouble on the border, all right.”

      Eldest pushed her plate back. “I’m afraid so.”

      “So, if we do be goin’ to the Immomain Border, d’ya think we’ll see some action?” Apple asked hopefully.

      “Apple, any soldier who knows what war is never wishes for ‘action’.”

      She nodded sadly. “My mamma said much the same. Still, I wouldn’t mind me a bit of war plunder.”

      Eldest chuckled. “The border is a godsforsaken wilderness. That’s why it’s the border. Just what sort of war plunder do you think you’ll be finding?”

      “Who knows? The Lost Emerald Seal of the False Eldest, maybe. I’d retire rich as a countess! Or even better,” she enthused, “I’m jus’ sure there’s some pretty, dark-haired Immomain boy gazing up at the stars, pinin’ away and waitin’ for some handsome Queenslander to come carry him away from his cruel sisters!”

      The Captain laughed. “’Carry him away?’ You’re too young to know what to do with a man even if you did catch one!”

      “I would too!” protested Apple. “I’d tie him to a bed, mount him like a stallion and teach him it’s a woman’s world and man’s place in it is to sire babies and wash diapers!”

      Laughter echoed down the table. The line was so obviously stolen from adult conversation and repeated without real knowledge of its meaning. Even the Captain grinned.

      “Officer material,” she told Eldest, gesturing at Apple. "Though it would be more convincing if she had some eggs to go with the bacon.”

      "My mamma was a plainswoman,” Apple declared, defending herself. “The gods made the plainswomen tall as the sky, strong as lightning, quick as the wind- And flat as the plains they ride on." 

      "Is that so?" chuckled Eldest. "Is that why you're so scrawny, not enough milk for you when you were a babe?"

      Apple's eyes were bright, willing to take a ribbing as well as give one. "Naw, that's not it. Plainswomen are so flat they don't nurse their babes at all. They jus’ find a badger-hole with a mamma-badger in it and tuck their babies up to the milk bar with the rest of the badger-cubs. That's how we grow up to be tough as badgers and twice as stubborn!"

      Eldest had to laugh at that, but was determined to score a few points of her own. “It’s a rotten little Apple that tells lies,” she scolded.

      “Sergeant,” their drummer-girl responded in a hurt tone, “I ain’t never tol’ a lie in my life… Though I do confess I may ‘ave stretched the truth a little, here and there.”

      “Na-na,” Eldest pounced. “You told those recruiters you were over sixteen, didn’t you? That was a lie.”

      “Was not!” came Apple’s hot reply. “You have to swear before the gods on the Holy Book, I’d never lie before the gods!”

      “Apple, there is no way you will convince me you’re sixteen years old.”

      “Naw,” she admitted. “I’m jus’ fourteen, m’birthday was in the fall.”

      “I'm not sure I believe even that, but my point still stands. You weren’t over sixteen when you swore,” she gave the girl a poke, “Which makes you a rotten little Apple.”

      “I was too over sixteen!” she huffed in outrage. “Before I went in, I made some pokeberry ink and wrote ‘16’ on both soles of m’feet. Not only was I over 16… I was over two of ‘em!” She leaned close, conspiratorially. “Rightly speaking, I was over thirty-two when I swore.”

      Eldest stared open mouthed at the grinning urchin beside her, then laughed until tears care to her eyes. Ruffling the girl’s newly trimmed hair, “Oh Apple, don’t change,” she wished her. “But no, there will be no war plunder for you. The Immies will stand on their side of the river and shout insults at us, we’ll stand on our side of the river and shout insults at them, and that’ll be the end of it.”

      “We hope,” amended Captain Hawthorne worriedly. She rose and excused herself. “Sergeant, if you find out anything else, I’d appreciate it you could give me a holler. It’s a whole lot easier to keep the brass happy if I have some idea of what they’re likely to want in advance.”

      Eldest nodded. “Of course, ma’am.”

Chapter Text

      Eldest was startled awake by reveille next morning. That, of course, was the purpose of reveille, but Eldest had gotten so used to it sounding like a cow in labor that it was a bit of a shock to hear it as it should be played, bright and brassy. Her cot creaked as she swung her legs over the side, briskly rising and dressing before stepping outside, where the troop was already gathering for the morning muster. There were two new faces by the fire; the company bugler, Eva, and the Colonel’s aide, Blackberry.

      “You see?” Apple was telling them. "Less puff in the cheeks, more buzz in the lips. You get a much brighter tone.”

      Eva and Blackberry waved and departed, heading off to their own musters while the Rangers formed up.

      “Giving lessons now, Apple?” she asked after the troop had been accounted for and the morning’s tasks divvied up.

      Apple nodded. “Beggin' your pardon, Sergeant, but they need a little help. They have the basics but need to work on their wind strength and tone.”

      Eldest looked at her curiously. "How is it you have more wind strength than two grown women?"

      Apple set her jaw in stubbornness. "Plainswoman blood. We howl with the wolves before we kin even talk, and it's all hootin’ and hollerin’s after that. Builds up the lungs right proper, it does!"

      "I see," Eldest drolled, swallowing her smile. "Well, we'll have to see if we can't requisition you a bugle as well as a drum. Mind you, it was a shock hearing reveille played as it ought to be played, but I could get used to it."

      As they chatted a runner came, summoning all the troops to a regimental muster at noon. Usually the Colonel let be with company musters, reserving Regimental musters for ceremonies and important news. Clearly today would be one of the latter. As noon rolled around the troop marched behind Apple's drum and took their place where the Regiment was drawn up by companies, eight of them arrayed before the tall flagpole on the parade ground. The muster began with raising the flags and honors to the Queens before the Colonel mounted a low podium and her booming voice rang out over the assembled companies.     

      "Troopers, I'm sure it will come as no surprise to hear there's been a change in our orders. The Imomain Imperials have been moving significant forces to the Border. Since the spring is a lousy time to campaign with the rivers running high, what they hope to accomplish isn't clear. However, there's at least a chance the 14th and the 2nd will need a little help keeping the Immies on their side of the river. So we, along with the 5th and 7th, have been directed to reinforce. Of the three, we have the farthest to go, but I have no intention of being Joanna-come-latelies to where the Queens need us. You can expect long days and hard marching. But we're the 22nd Shiloh- What are we?" she challenged.

      "The Iron Regiment!" rolled the reply from a thousand throats.

      "What do our foes call us?" The colonel roared back.

      "The Ladies from Hell!" the assembly thundered in reply.

      "Where do we want to be?" trumpeted the Colonel.

      "AT THE FRONT!!!" her regiment screamed as one.

      "Exactly! So that's where we're going! Now, Supply tells me that we'll be ready to move in two days. We leave at first light on the third. I know that every troop and company has a thousand things to do before marching, but while we're all assembled, there's a few housekeeping chores that have been put off too long..."

      There were awards to be handed out, promotions announced, even new recruits to be welcomed. The new arrivals swelled the 22nd to a little over three-quarters strength, not bad at all for peacetime. Finally, to her surprise, she and Apple were called to the podium. As they arrived, Jasper was led up in splendidly polished brass tack, tail nervously flicking back and forth.

      "When I offered this particular bit of horseflesh and deviltry to the first woman who could ride him, I might have guessed it would be a Queen's Ranger claiming the honors," announced the Colonel. "However, I never would have guessed that Queen's Ranger would barely come up to my belt-buckle!"

      Laughter rolled over the assembled companies as the Colonel handed Jasper's reins to an astonished Apple. "In any case, though, he's yours now. I don't know if congratulations or condolences are in order, but either way… Try not to get yourself killed!"

      The companies cheered and Jasper started to light-foot at the noise, but Apple expertly twitched his nose down, fishing in her pockets and offering him something from within. Suddenly more interested in her than the noise, he settled. "Thankee kindly, ma'am, I'll be sure to train him up right well!" she beamed.

      "I don't doubt it," the Colonel returned, deadpan as she always was, but somehow with a ghost of smile in her words.

      The Colonel turned back to the assembled companies. "And that's all for today. I want every troop ready to march in two days, or I will know the reason why! Dismissed!"

      Eldest sent Apple off and was turning to go herself when the Colonel asked her to stay. Going to the command tent, the Iron Lady offered her a seat and wine, both of which she accepted gratefully.

      "I think you can see how it is," said the Colonel quietly. "To scout and screen a movement of this size would require a full column of Rangers, minimum. I have just one troop, yours. I've been promised another troop when we get to Santi-Judith, but that's no help now. I'm going to be leaning very heavily on you and your women."

      "We won't let you down, ma'am," Eldest replied earnestly.

      "I know. I can't tell you how grateful I am that if I only have one troop, yours is the one I have."

      Swelling with pride, Eldest straightened in her seat. "Thank you for that, ma'am."

      "You've earned it. Now, the one bit of good news I have is that I've managed to steal two companies of regular cavalry. They're newly-raised and green as summer grass, but both are nearly full strength."

      "That is good news. If they can screen while we scout, yes that would take a great deal of weight off our shoulders."

      "I thought so as well. The question is, do you want some of them for scouts as well?"

      Eldest shook her head. "Let's assess them as we go, ma'am, but screening is pretty straightforward; scouting's a whole different beast."

      "Very well. If there's anything you need that Supply can grant, be sure that Major Kiverly knows about it."

      "Yes, Ma'am."

      "Before you go, Captain Thomas of the 3rd Company asked me to pass on a request for her. Sergeant-Major Duvos died in her sleep last night, the service is this evening."

      "Mags died? Oh, that's awful. She should have retired years ago, but still, a heavy loss."

      "She should have retired," the Colonel agreed, "But she had no living daughters, the 22nd was her only family. I could never bring myself to force her out on grounds of age."

      A lump rose in Eldest's throat. "Thank you for that kindness, Colonel. I'm sure Mags would have preferred to go leading a charge into the enemy, but this was far better than alone and forgotten in some old soldier's home."

      The Colonel sighed heavily. "I thought so, too. Captain Thomas invites you to attend, of course, but she also asked for that new drummer-girl of yours. If she does 'taps' half as well as she did reveille this morning, it would be an improvement to the service. Blackberry does her best, but… Well, I can command a girl to play the bugle, but I can't command her to have talent at it."

      "I'm sure Apple would be pleased to come, Ma'am. We'll be there."

Chapter Text

      Apple's playing brought tears to more than one set of eyes, including Eldest's own. Next morning, a shiny new bugle was delivered to their encampment by Major Kiverly herself. "Mags was a friend," she told Apple gruffly. "You earned this."

      "Thankee kindly, ma'am," Apple beamed, face shining in the brass, though she then sobered. "It was an honor to play for such a fine soldier."

      "She was that," agreed the Major. "I hope you don't mind the duty. After last night, well, a regiment loses women occasionally. When we do, we want to remember them properly. People will be coming to you for that."

      Apple stood tall, or as tall as she could- which wasn’t very. "Taps is a privilege, not a duty. I'll stand ready, you'll see."

      Major Kiverly laughed. "I'm sure you will. Stop by Supply when you're free, the darnedest things fall off shelves sometimes, and have to be surplused.”

Chapter Text

      The next two days were a whirlwind of preparation. Though one of the reasons Eldest hadn't been keen on taking on a drummer-girl was the prospect of having a raw recruit underfoot, she suddenly understood why the Colonel valued her aide Blackberry so much. A message needed a courier? Apple was free to run it. A broken halter needed fixing? Apple ran it over to the leathersmith. Even at her level command involved a lot of fetch and carry, and not having to pull one of her troopers from other tasks was a godsend. Add to that Apple was literate and could make lists, tally figures and track supplies. If she'd known the little scamp would be this useful she'd have press-ganged her that first night.

      As the regiment formed columns at dawn on the third day Eldest assembled the troop at the van, then rode back to the wagon train. There she found Apple, sitting on a caisson, awaiting the start of march.

      "Apple, I'll need the whole troop with me in the van. I'll want you here in the wagon train. The wagons will likely stop long before we're back, so you're in charge of our camp. I'll want our tents pitched and bedrolls laid each night."

      Apple nodded seriously. "Any other orders Sergeant?"

      "Yes... stay out of trouble."

      Apple gave her a hurt look. "Sergeant, I've never gone lookin’ fer trouble in my life. But I've noticed it has a powerful way of findin’ me when it wants to."

      Eldest gave the girl her best winter smile. "Then you'll just have to get better at staying out of its way. Stay out of trouble, make yourself useful where you can. Those are your orders."

      Apple nodded somberly. "Yes, Sergeant."    

Chapter Text

      Moving over a thousand women eight hundred miles was not a thing done easily or painlessly. Scouting and screening that movement was a massive challenge. The two companies of cavalry the Colonel had scrounged up helped immensely, covering the regiment's flanks, but the scouting and pathfinding were properly Ranger jobs. So her women were in the saddle twelve to fourteen hours a day, cycling through remounts as they went. The horses got a break. Her women did not. But by the time the regiment had been on the road for two weeks life had fallen into a pattern of movement. The troop rode out at first light, scouting the road and assessing the local communities the regiment would pass through. Eldest sent troopers back every so often with reports for the Colonel and her staff. Inquiries or orders would flow back up the road with her troopers as they returned from courier duties, and the process would repeat. Towards evening they'd drift back to eat and sleep with the regiment. Eldest was going over the next day's march with Rose when Bea stopped by. "If you have a moment, you might want to see this," she said, amused.

      "A break would be welcome. Is there a concern?"

      "Not really. I saw Apple underneath the buckboard after mess and I wondered what she was doing there. Come see."

      The troop was assigned a single buckboard wagon to haul their tentage and other gear. Bea led them under it and pointed out an addition. Carefully constructed from discarded boxes was a sort of cubby area underneath the wagon. It was so well made Eldest didn't realize what it was until Meg turned a little bent nail latch and it opened, revealing a magpie's hoard of little treasures. Most of it was food; there were stacks of hardtack carefully wrapped in waxed paper, jerked beef in salt pouches, tinned rations, a few potatoes and even a sack of precious flour. But there were also little tins holding buttons and pins, glass bottles, clay marbles and even a cracked powder horn and few bullets, all clearly scrounged or salvaged around the camp.

      "There's another storage area built under the buckboard seat with even more," Meg told her. "She's like a little chipmunk, preparing for winter."

      Eldest sighed. "I'll have to speak to her. There's no need to do this when the commissary serves or issues rations every night."

      Rose shook her head stolidly. "I'd leave her be, if I were you. Bringing it up would just embarrass her. I've seen this before, in girls who've been hungry. They hoard, and you can't break them of it. When she has enough saved up to feel safe, she'll stop."

      "You think?" asked Eldest doubtfully.

      Rose shrugged. "Every other girl I've known like this has."

      Eldest nodded. Rose was a bit of an anomaly, being of an age most troopers retired, and a transfer from the regular army, which made her very old for her Ranger rank of private. At this point she was mostly shepherding the career of her youngest sister Peony. They'd had other sisters, Eldest had heard, but between skirmishes and camp fevers only the two Flower-girls were left. There were few troopers Eldest respected more, though. "Fair enough. If it becomes a problem we'll speak to her about it, otherwise just let her be."

Chapter Text

      It was supposed to be *drier* out west, Eldest despaired, but if anything, the opposite was true. The rain would start as miserable drizzles, then pour as if the gates of heaven had opened, then return to the same cold, wet damp misery, leaving muddy, rutted roads and washed out bridges in its wake. But the roads had to be assessed, the bridges marked for the engineers, alternate routes scouted, and the greater part of that work fell on the Rangers.

      The last light had gone before they reached the camp, so it was near pitch dark as she and the rest of the troop staggered into the encampment, handing off horses as exhausted as they were into the hands of grooms resentful at being called out into the rain. They'd missed evening mess, so all that they might expect was hardtack and salt beef. Her stomach recoiled at the thought, even hungry as she was. They'd have to rise at dawn to do this all again, perhaps they could skip supper, eat a larger breakfast. She looked over her women, as tired and bedraggled as she was. If she offered them food or sleep, she knew sleep would win out. Getting hot food would take at least an hour, if they could get it at all in this rain.

      "Sergeant!" piped a bright, cheerful voice, and Apple emerged out of the darkness, carrying a lantern. Somehow she'd obtained an oilskin slicker that almost fit her, her oversized boots splashing in the mud. "There you are! Mess tent's this way!"

      "Apple," she started wearily. "Mess'll be closed by now."

      "Naw," Apple shook her head, scattering beaded droplets of water. "Cavalry came in awhile back, said you Rangers was an hour behind. I told Cookie, she promised to git something together for y'all. This way!" she commanded imperiously, leading them on to where the mess tent glowed in the darkness, lit from within. Walking like dead women the troop flowed in a wave behind, gratefully settling into benches while Apple ferried a steaming pot of tucker around, ladling their bowls full. Eldest never thought she would ever be grateful for tucker, but it was hot, warming hands around tin bowls and even more importantly, warming their bodies from the inside out. To their surprise and delight, Apple had even brought their cups from camp and poured a precious measure of hot rum for each of them. Warmed within and without, the troop started to come to life a little, or at least look less like dead women walking.

      Grateful as she was, Eldest still pursed her lips in worry. "Apple, where did the rum come from? You're not pilfering from Supply are you?" If there was one thing that would set every trooper's hand against you, it was pilfering rum. Every dram pilfered was one less to be shared out.

      Apple looked shocked. "No, Sergeant! Drummer girls are issued a measure jus’ like everyone else, but I can't abide the taste, so mostly I save mine. This is the last few weeks’ worth."

      "You're sharing your rum?" asked Peony in wonder, putting hers down. "Apple, we can't take your rum, that's for you."

      "Like I said, I can't abide the taste. Besides, my mamma always said strong drink didn't suit a young'un like me. If you don't drink it, it'll go to waste."

      "Wasting good rum... or even this stuff... is a sin," observed Rose. "Drink up, Peony."

      "Too cold to argue," she agreed, downing the rest of her cup.

      Apple nodded approvingly. "Now, I got all your blankets dry round the cook fires earlier today, and your second set of unders, too. So if y'all sleep in them, you kin leave yer wet clothes out fer me and we kin get 'em dry by the morrow."

      "Warm blankets, dry clothes? Apple, you're a gem! But you'll be up all night!

      "That don't be a matter. I kin sleep in the buckboard during the day."

      Once they finished Apple herded them off to their tents with full bellies, and as she had promised, they woke to dry clothes next morning. It was astonishing how much 'morale' really meant 'hot food and dry clothes.'

      Eldest got her troopers on the road, promising to catch up while she made a point of seeking out the 7th's mess cook, a heavyset woman appropriately named Cookie, to thank her personally. "Cookie, that supper last night was more than welcome; thank you, you didn't have to do that, late as we all were."

      Cookie looked at her sourly. "It's a little hard to refuse," she replied tartly, "when you're being routed out of bed with your own kitchen poker!"

      "Routed out? You mean Apple? Don't tell me she…"

      "She bloody well did," complained Cookie. "I wasn't in my cot five minutes before she was nattering at me to get something on for you lot. I told her to go to hell. That's when the poker showed up. If it wasn't for the fact I get two hours of honest work out of her each day, I'd have wrapped it around her pretty little neck!"

      "Apple... works for you?" Eldest asked, suddenly realizing she had no idea of what her drummer-girl did all the long day while the troop was out. Though now that she thought on it, she had ordered Apple to make herself useful.

      "She does. Good little worker, too. After she sees you lot off she helps with breakfast cleanup for an hour or so. The wagons start moving by then, and I understand she heads off to Major Kiverly in Supply after that. Runs courier for the Colonel too. Then as evening rolls around and the wagons stop I get her for dinner prep, another hour or two if the Colonel doesn't hold her up. She earns her keep, I'll admit that," Cookie's look softened, before giving her another scowl. "But don't go getting used to hot meals at all hours. I like my sleep as much as the next woman!"

      "Perish the thought," Eldest told her placatingly, then stalked off to find their wayward drummer-girl. To her credit, she found her in their camp, taking down their tents and packing them in the buckboard.

      "Apple, did you really roust Cookie out of her cot with her own fire poker?" Eldest asked accusingly.

      "Well-all, I reckon I did," Apple admitted, looking only slightly guilty. "But it's not as bad as that all sounds. You know how some mules won't work unless you show ‘em the whip, like it's a point of pride to 'em? Cookie's a bit like that. A poke or two was all that's was needed and she got right up to git me past the sentries and the fire started. She went back to her cot right after. I didn't git her up for moren' ten minutes, honest!"

      Eldest looked at their little urchin ruefully. "You do know Cookie outranks you, yes? You're a drummer-girl, everyone outranks you. In the army, subordinates do not normally wake their superiors with a poker! I don't know whether I should be giving you a medal or clapping you in irons!"

      Apple had the grace to look a bit abashed. "I guess I hadn't thought about it that way. Cookie's, well, Cookie. Kinda like one of those cookies that're hard on the outside, soft on the inside, but you have to git past the hard part first? Everyone jollies her along like that, she kinda expects it… demands it, really."

      "I'm pretty sure no one else jollies her along with a fire poker!"

      "Well, maybe not," Apple admitted, "but it worked," she finished plaintively.

      "It did," Eldest shook her head ruefully. "I'll say that supper was more than welcome. If we actually make it to the river without losing a woman to the pneumonia it'll be because of the care you've taken for us all. I'm not blind to that. But no more fire pokers, please…" she paused, reflecting, "unless it's really cold and damp… and late and dark… and you've already tried every other way to get Cookie up first."

      "Like the frying pan?" asked Apple impishly.

      "Apple..." Eldest gritted her teeth. 

      "I hear you clear, Sergeant, and it shouldn't be a problem," Apple assured her.  "I explained the 'sichuation to Major Kiverly this mornin’, and she's gonna issue me a cook kettle all our own. I won't have to roust out Cookie from now on in."

      "Well... that's better then," Eldest tousled Apple's golden mop of hair. "I understand you work for Major Kiverly in Supply, too?"

      Apple nodded. "It gets boring riding in the buckboard all day, and it's good to have friends in Supply."

      "Good thinking."

      "Major Kiverly thinks I ought to strike for Supply when I git old enough to enlist. She says I gots a good head for figures and a talent fer organizin’ things."

      Eldest had to put down a surprising surge of annoyance at Major Kiverly for trying to poach their drummer girl, but forced herself to consider the issue dispassionately. Apple was too small for a line soldier. Supply might be a very good fit indeed.

      "That... might be worth thinking about," she said cautiously.

      Apple nodded. "It makes some sense, but I don't know that I could abide a desk all day. I'm a plainsgirl, we need to ride every day or the sun goes dark and the world comes to an end!"

      Eldest chuckled. "Is that how you come to be riding courier for the Colonel?"

      "Ay-yup. I gots to be exercisin’ Jasper anyhow, so it don't be a matter to carry some dispatches while we're at it."

      "You're riding that bone-breaker every day and you're still alive?"

      "Aww, Jasper's not that bad, and he's gettin’ even better. He's got a set to his ways, but he's done smart fer a horse. Give me a smart horse over a dumb one any day. Smart you kin work with, dumb jus’ stays dumb."

      "Funny, I was just thinking the same thing about drummer girls. Keep up the good work, Apple."

Chapter Text

      The days and miles crawled by and despite the engineer's best efforts a bridge had given way under the weight of so many heavy wagons traversing it, separating most of the Regiment from its supplies. As the engineers worked to rebuild the main bridge, a rickety pontoon bridge was constructed to get the supplies, mostly food, to the women who needed them. Mess was out of the question; it would be catch as catch can, and Eldest just hoped they'd catch something other than cold hardtack and watery coffee. Which made it all the more surprising that when she found the knot of their tents in the haphazard encampment, Meg came up to her, smiling. "Here," she said, shoving a tin plate and bowl at her. "Eat up while it's hot!"

      Eldest stared at what she had been given, which looked suspiciously like fresh biscuits and a stew of some kind. There was even a smear of butter along the plate. It smelled heavenly, which was disappointing, because it meant she was dreaming and would wake up as soon as she tried to take a bite. She sat as the earlier-arriving members of the troop scooted down to give her room. She dressed a biscuit with a smear of butter and bit in, the warmth and favor filling her mouth and setting it watering for more. The stew was oddly spiced with a smoky, tart flavor to it, but her tongue tasted meat and potatoes and even a delicate taste of onions and mushrooms. And she still hadn't woken up. "Gods and Prophets above, where did this come from?" she asked, digging in.

      “Do’ya really like it?" asked Apple, pleased.

      "It's... wonderful," murmured Eldest around a mouthful, as the other women nodded or grunted their agreement. "What is it?"

      "Jus’ prairie stew and biscuits, is all."

      "What's in prairie stew?" asked Sarah, scraping her bowl with her spoon, chasing the last little bits.

      "Well," Apple ticked off the ingredients on her fingers. "Meat, whatever you can catch, roots and tubers, whatever you can find, spices, whatever you have, all in a wine, beer or rum sauce."

      "Whatever you can catch?" asked Sarah, apprehensive. "Er... what was it you caught?" she asked faintly.

      "For this one? Some gopher and ground squirrel, but mostly rattlesnake."

      "Rattlesnake?" Sarah cringed, a little green.

      "It won't harm you none," Apple assured her. "The poison's in the head and I leave that part out. Tastes like chicken, jus’ a little stringier."

      "It sure does," agreed Eldest, greedily devouring hers. "Is this another thing your mother taught you?"

      "Naw, it was Papa Bear Sibley taught me cookin’ and such."

      "Papa Bear?"

      "The Sibley's husband. I think his given name were James, but everyone called ‘im Papa Bear. That was when I was too big to be a papoose on my mamma's back, but too little to ride and rope with the women... or so my mamma thought anyway," she amended, aggrieved. "We was riding with the Sibleys then, before they traded range parcels with the Alinee, so Mamma foisted me off on Papa Bear in the wagon train. Papa Bear, he had a powerful lot of wives and young'uns to feed, so he couldn't abide a set of idle hands. Besides, he done tol' me that it wasn't likely I'd ever have a husband, so learnin' t' cook wouldn't hurt me none, and might keep me from starvin'."

      "You've met a male? Really?" asked Rebecca, impressed. "What are they like?"

      Apple looked a little uncertain. "Well... they're... nice, I guess. Most times, they're not much different from women, jus’, you know... Bigger. And hairier. And louder."

      "Bigger?" asked Emma.

      "Hairier?" asked May.

      "Louder?" asked Diana.

      Apple nodded enthusiastically. "Papa Bear was as big and furry as any old cave bear. He had whiskers down to here," she gestured at her chest, "And a lap that would fit four young'uns across for story time. He had a deep rumbling voice that could put you to sleep when it was low and wake you up right quick when it was loud and you could hear his growl three counties away."

      "Three whole counties?" repeated Rebecca, eyes wide.

      "I think," put in Eldest, for Rebecca showed every indication of swallowing the tale whole, "that a certain rotten Apple is stretching the truth a little. Again."

      "Maybe a little," Apple demurred modestly. "But it makes a better tell this way. Besides, the Sibley wives always said only plainswomen were brave enough to marry plainsmen."

       May shuddered. "Maybe I won't try to make it into the Order of the Sword after all. Men sound like horrible trolls!"

      "Naw, it's not like that," Apple shook her head. "Papa Bear might have been as big and burly as a troll, but he was the gentlest soul you could imagine. His growl might be fierce but my mamma always used to tell me that Papa Bear's worst growl was less dangerous than some women's smiles. Even though he had thirty wives and more young'uns than he could count, he never played favorites, never skipped a wife, loved each and every one as they ought to be loved. He also never forgot a little one's name, not even the ones born the day before. Story time with him was the best. The Sibleys had a passle of picture-books, and when the day was done Ol' Papa Bear would take out a couple and give us all a story before bed."

      "A man who could read?" asked Sarah, wide-eyed.

      "Well... not exactly," admitted Apple. "Papa Bear knew a few words, but mostly he'd look at the pictures and make us up a story that fit them. I was plumb disappointed when I learned to read, and the stories in the books weren't half as good a tell as the ones Papa Bear told out of his head. 'The Husband War between the Ducks and Swans' was way better than any ol' 'Ugly Duckling' story, I'll tell you that for nothin’."

      Around the fire faces were envious. As poor and threadbare as Apple had been when she came to them, she'd had something none of them, sired out of the cribs, had had; A father, or at least a father-figure.

      "The Sibleys must have been a generous family," Eldest ventured to break the silence, "letting a stranger's child close to their husband."

      Apple nodded. "Plainswomen are like that. The best friends, or worst enemies you could have. Of course, it helped that I was a bit small for husband raidin’ back then. Not to mention even an entire family together couldn’t move the Papa Bear iffin the Papa Bear didn't want to be moved."

      "He doesn't sound very biddable," Catherine complained.

      "Naw, he wasn't. The Sibley wives all said that if the Papa Bear ain't happy, ain't no one going to be happy, but my mamma said, 'If a woman wants a little sauce, she has to be willing to put up with a little spirit'."

      "So what happened with you and the Sibleys, then?" asked Eldest.

      "Well, the Sibleys had five sons, though two of them died along with a passle of sisters when the yellow fever came. But that still left 'em three sons and when they reached marryin' age they swapped two of them for husbands and they traded the last to the Alinee. As part of the trade the Sibleys and the Alinee swapped their ranges, which would put them to the west of the North Branch, and Mamma always stayed to the east. I think she had an old quarrel out west, though I never knew the bones of it. Anyhowsy, we stayed east of the Branch and started workin’ fer other families."

      "Like the Bozes," Eldest observed.

      A shadow seem to fall across Apple's face, the joy and chattiness chased away. "Yeah," she said quietly. "Them."

Chapter Text

      That evening marked a change in the troop’s diet. There was nothing to be done about the rations they ate on the road, but most evenings they came home to something Apple had cooked for them. Often enough there was something for breakfast as well. The menu was rather random, usually a stew or a soup of some kind along with biscuits or bread, but it was always far tastier than what was on offer from the 7^th company mess, so much so they rarely went to mess. All was not perfect of course. The troop quickly learned it was better not to inquire too closely on the origins of what they ate. Apple, raised plains-frugal, wasted nothing that was edible. If the result was tasty the source often left something to be desired. It turned out that the snakes and lizards she fed them were the ones that had failed to make it across the road before being caught by a heavy wagon wheel. Once, just once, Eldest had asked how on Earth she had obtained the tasty rice that flavored one soup, only to be cheerfully told it wasn’t rice but rather black ant larvae. Then too, Apple’s sense of spices was also suspect. When she said ‘spices, whatever you have’ she meant it quite literally. Sometimes her odd combinations worked surprisingly well; Her mesquite and honey glazed roast prairie grouse was simply delicious. But the less said about her rose and dill lizard soup the better. On the whole, though, it was a vast improvement over standard Army fare, so much so she made a small but profitable business of selling the extra to troopers desperate for a change of pace.

      Meanwhile, the regiment continued its march to the Border. The weather plagued them for much of the march, but it was bright and sunny as they marched into the sprawling encampment just outside of the border town of Santi-Judith.

      While the rest of the regiment encamped, the Colonel was summoned to meet the overall commander on the Border, General Falkirk. Since the Colonel valued Eldest's opinion on operational matters, Eldest went as well.

      The general's command tent was spacious, but even so was crowded with the staffs of General Falkirk's brigade and the regimental staff of the 22nd. Eldest found an out-of-the-way niche as General Falkirk, a soft-voiced voluptuous woman, brought her meeting to order.

      "Welcome gentlewomen. Before we get started I'd like to begin by welcoming the first of our promised reinforcements, Colonel Wellsbury and her staff of the 22nd Shiloh. Despite," she emphasized the word, "being the unit that had farthest to travel, they are nonetheless the first here. Welcome, Colonel, and may I note my personal appreciation for your promptness."

      "Thank you, General. I am blessed with superb women in supply, engineering and reconnaissance."

      "You certainly must be, to make the time you did in this weather," Falkirk observed. "However, in my experience it's a good commander that makes good troopers, not the other way around. You can be sure that will be noted in my dispatches. Now, let’s get down to brass tacks."

       She nodded at a large map of the Blue Dagger river and its surrounding lands, pinned up on one of the white canvas walls of the tent. "The Immies usually maintain one of their oversized Imperial regiments here, along with a rump training regiment that's usually about quarter-strength. Say about two thousand women all told for the entire river, from the mountains to the sea. We maintain about the same, two regiments, currently the 2nd and the 14th, organized in my 16th Brigade. Two thousand women is pretty much the minimum needed to patrol the river, back up the Queen's Justice in the border towns and keep the smuggling down to something reasonable. Those numbers do not allow aggressive action by either side.

      “However, about two months ago our intelligence noted additional Imperial regiments arriving to the border. At first we thought it was just their summer relief arriving early, but then it became clear this was something bigger as additional forces began to arrive and the forces already here did not rotate out.  Currently, they have three Imperial regiments in bivouac along the river, mostly concentrated around the northern and southern fords around Tradetown and Santi-Judith. There's also evidence of a fourth regiment trickling in, which, when it fully arrives, would give them about eight thousand women if those regiments are full strength- which we don't think they are.

      “Currently, we have my 16th Brigade, a large passel of odds and ends, and our newly-arrived sisters in the 22nd, giving us about four thousand. Once our other two regiments get here, we'll increase our numbers to some six thousand."

      "Still less than those opposed to us," noted one of the Colonels.

      "Yes," agreed Falkirk. "I've been promised some more odds and ends to get our numbers up, including a regiment of royal marines that will be arriving via ship at Gulfport. That’s assuming the Navy can be persuaded to pull their anchors out of the mud for once, of course. But our best defense is still the river itself. The most puzzling thing about all this is what the Immomains hope to accomplish with all this movement. The spring is a lousy time to campaign here anyway, but with it as wet as this one has been, it's downright impossible. With the river flooded as it is now, a handful of women could stand off an entire army, with time left over for swiving their menfolk on the side."

      "Perhaps they mean to start their campaign when the river subsides?" asked one of the majors.

      General Falkirk shook her head. "If so, why give us warning by arriving so early? We'll be able to match their numbers easily by the time the river subsides. It makes no sense. But just because it makes no sense to us, doesn't mean it makes no sense to the Immies. Perhaps they're testing our response time. Perhaps they think we'll make a mistake. Perhaps there's just a spare princess they want out from underfoot in the capital. Hopefully our intelligence assets on the Imomain side of the border will be able to discover that for us. But in any case we have to get ourselves disposed to meet any possible threat.

      “Now," she picked up a pointer, went to the map and touched the river delta, "between Gulfport's fortifications and the flooding of the spring marshes, it's pretty much invulnerable. We've lightly reinforced the garrison, but as far as we can tell the Immies don't have units within a hundred miles. That leaves the fords at Tradetown, Santi-Judith and Freehold." She touched each one in turn, pointing them out. "To get to Freehold they have to go through mountain passes that still have sixteen feet of snow blocking them, and there is absolutely no evidence that they're even trying. What they *are* doing is concentrating at Tradetown and Santi-Judith."

      "Concentrating?" came the Colonel’s terse question.

      "Concentrating," confirmed General Falkirk. "Say a little under half at Tradetown, the rest here at Santi-Judith. They've encamped, they are drilling, training, holding military reviews... Hell, according to our sources they even had a *parade* down the main thoroughfare at Pueblo de Comercio! They are strutting like virgin boys in Season, like they want all the world to see it. However, none of that changes the fact that the fords are flooded and will be so for weeks if not months as the mountain snows melt. So the question becomes: Why are they here?"

      "Do we know who is commanding them?" asked Colonel Wellsbury.

      General Falkirk nodded. "At least in theory, they're commanded by a Princess Esperanza. We know relatively little about her; she's one of the older middle sisters, about twenty-two years old, undistinguished, hasn't been awarded a husband or even husband rights by her grandmothers yet. Usually these princesses fight tooth and nail for command of combat troops, but until now this Esperanza seems to have spent her time in their equivalent of Supply & Logistics. But she's probably only the titular commander; the actual commander is likely an older, wiser and more experienced officer."

      The Colonel frowned. "She has experience in Supply, so she has to know something of the operational arts. She has to know the difficulties of a spring campaign, but she's here anyway. She's been given at least nominal command over eight thousand women, and she's brought them here, on our doorstep. I don't like it."

      "Neither do I," agreed Falkirk. "But these are the cards we've been dealt."

      The Colonel nodded in acknowledgement, and Falkirk continued. "Presently my Sixteenth Brigade is split between Tradetown and Santi-Judith, together with our odds and ends, about fifteen hundred women in each location. Colonel Wellsbury, until our other reinforcements get here, I'd like you and the 22nd to be our flying reserves. I'd like to position you on this rise here," she gestured to the map, "about halfway between Tradetown and Santi-Judith. There's an old marching-camp there, left over from the Two-Dagger war. It's in rough shape, but it should provide a foundation to start from. That way you're in position to reinforce in either direction as needed and," she noted, "I know you can march damn fast when you need to."

      The Colonel nodded. "That's a good fit. The 22nd is honored by your trust in us, ma'am."

      "Excellent. Now, there's one last thing I want all of you to remember. The locals here, the border-women, are about as loyal Queenswomen as anyone could ask for. Fanatically loyal, in most cases. They know how the Immies treat their lower classes, particularly the Peonas, and they want no part of it. However, they've been trading -or raiding- brothers back and forth with the Immies for centuries now. Their loyalties are not always clear, not even to themselves. The Martins and the Martinez families, for example, happened when both families went husband raiding on the same day, and ended up swapping brothers. The typical Border woman hates the Immies for various slights, real and imagined, but when it comes to actually sending lead their way, they hesitate because they might end up hitting a cousin. It gets that complicated here, and it gets that complicated very quickly. So we, as outsiders, have to tread lightly. I want the locals resenting the Immies, not the Queen's Army. Therefore, you need to keep a tight leash on your women. In particular, there is to be no foraging on the Queensland, not of game and especially not of menfolk either. Clear?"

      "Menfolk?" asked one of the majors.

      Falkirk nodded. "If nothing else, your women are going to hear of the Wheeler twins. Right now it’s all the locals discuss, it’s not like you’ll be able to avoid it. Alike as two peas in a pod, beautiful as the day is long, almost marrying age... Just the sort of thing to put ideas in the heads of, well, just about every woman ever born. That's exactly what we, and the Queens, don't need just now. I expect you all to run tight encampments, to know where your women are, and to keep them out of the hair of the locals."

      Murmured assents filled the room, and when it was clear there were no further questions, Falkirk dismissed them to their duties.

Chapter Text

      At Santi-Judith they also met their long-promised Ranger reinforcements, another Ranger troop led by a graying, trim woman with a crooked nose, Sergeant-Major Bounder. Eldest had gone to that meeting with trepidation. The way the Rangers were scattered around the Army it had been years since she'd actually dealt with someone in her own chain of command, and as Sergeant-Major, Bounder outranked her. At the very least she expected to lose two women to Bounder's troop, which was two women short. The problem of selection had been haunting her mind but fortunately Bounder was an earthy, practical woman.

      "My orders were to get to Santi-Judith, then present my orders attaching my troop to the 22nd to your Colonel Wellsbury," Bounder explained. "We arrived a fortnight ago, but the brass weren't keen on giving me and my women two weeks of vacation, so we were seconded to Brigadier-General Butler's 14th regiment. Brigadier Butler has discovered she likes having two Ranger troops available to her regiment, so I don't reckon we'll be attached to the 22nd for very long."

      Eldest grimaced. "So the Brass are arm-wrestling for the Rangers again?"

      "Ay-yup. Whatever else you can say about Brigadier Butler, though, she is a brigadier. Your Wellsbury is just a Colonel, so Butler's going to win unless General Falkirk intervenes, which she isn't likely to do. She hates getting involved in what she sees as chain-of-command issues."

      "What's Falkirk like?"

      "Deceptively easygoing. She's competent, but also patient. She likes to give people just enough rope to hang themselves, then she pulls the trap door. Don't let the soft voice and motherly figure fool you."

      "Good to know. What of Brigadier Butler? What's she doing in charge of a regiment, anyway? That's a Colonel's job."

      "Brigadier Butler is an officer."

      "That bad, eh?"

      "Brigadier Butler is an officer," Bounder repeated with a grin.

      Eldest nodded. "That bad. Got it."

      Eldest hesitated, then decided to broach the subject. "I'm grateful you're not filling out your troop at the expense of mine. I figured you'd take one woman at least."

      "The thought had occurred to me," Bounder admitted. "However, I had a meeting with your Colonel when I presented my orders and she threatened to peel me with a dull knife if I so much as touched a hair on the heads of you or any of your women."

      "Sweet mothers. Did she really say that?"  

      "No." Bounder shuddered. "She didn't have to. That woman can say more with a glance that any two-hour sermon I've ever suffered through. Is the Iron Lady really as bad as they say?"

      "Bad? No, not at all. She has high standards, but if you don't let her down, she won't let you down. I wish more officers were like her."

      Bounder sighed. "And it looks like I'm stuck with Butler. Ah, well. I'm a short-timer anyway. One more year, then out. You can put up with anything for a year."

      Eldest laughed. "Out and then what?"

      "It's all arranged," Bounder told her proudly. "I muster out a Sergeant-Major of Rangers, then I'll be joining the Queen's Justice in Northaven as a bright, shiny loo-tenant. I keep my nose clean a year or two there and I can put in to transfer to Heron Landing. I even get to take two of my oldest troop women with me."

      "Into the Justice and they even make you an officer? Congratulations."

      "One more year. I have to keep my eye on the prize. My daughters are in Heron Landing, law-clerking for a river engrosser."

      "They didn't join the army?" That was unusual. Most soldiers’ daughters followed in their mothers’ footsteps.

      "No, even though I encouraged them to. The army's been good to me, but my Eldest is an ambitious type. She wants it all: a house, a husband, and a name that doesn't scream 'Army' like 'Ranger' does. All the while she was growing up, I kept telling her there's no money to be made in lawyering; who's going to pay a lawyer to settle a dispute when there are good axe-handles and pistols to hand? She told me different, though, and now I reckon she was right. She figures five, maybe six more years and they'll be able to afford a husband of modest breeding."

      Eldest laughed, "I guess we all missed our calling, then."

      Bounder shook her head with a grin. "Not me. With lawyers it's all paper and precedents and 'she said this', 'she said that' and long hot days in stuffy courthouses. Give me the open range and problems I can shoot."

      "A woman after my own heart. Just remember, once you're a high-and-mighty Queen's Justice, if you ever get called on a troop of Rangers getting a little rowdy in a saloon… Go easy on 'em."

      "Ha! I'll do better than that. Who ever heard of Rangers getting rowdy on leave? I'll fine the saloonkeep fer interrupting good clean wholesome fun!"

      Eldest grinned. "I might hold you to that. Fair trails, Bounder."

      "Fair trails, Eldest. Look me up if you ever pass through Heron Landing."

Chapter Text

      The march to their new encampment, an old fortress/camp left over from the Two Dagger War, was straightforward and almost leisurely compared to their frantic march to the river. Though the rains had stopped the desert was still a riot of color, scented by the a million flowers blooming all at once. The air was filled with the sound of birds and insects calling, the sagebrush alive with skittering gophers, lizards, coyotes and more. It was so leisurely in fact, that Apple could ride with the troop in the van, trotting along on Jasper and proud as a peacock to be 'a real Ranger', as she put it. As they rode Eldest noted that though Apple was still tiny compared to the troopers she rode with, the stirrups on Jasper's saddle had been let down two notches. Apparently eating regularly and not being abused by her employers agreed with the girl. Towards mid-day though, she angled her horse away from the column, heading out into the brush.

      "Hoy! Drummer-girl!" Eldest called after her. "Where are you going?"

      Apple reined Jasper to the side. "I need to make water!"

      Eldest gave her an askance look. "In the Army we call that pissing. What's the fuss? Dismount, crouch and piss by the road like everyone else does."

      Apple looked scandalized at the suggestion. She raised her nose primly, and replied in singsong: "Sergeant, in my family we do not flash our slits and clits and piss like common tinker's daughters. We go behind a bush to hide our bush and there we *make our water*."

      Eldest laughed. Apple's singsong tone left no doubt this was something her mother had taught her. Eldest even recognized the line, from an old play about a rich family fallen on hard times, trying to keep up gentle manners in their daughters despite their coarsening situation. An oddly coincidental choice considering Hope's speculation that Apple's mother had likely been a well-to-do outcast. Not for the first time Eldest wished they knew more about her. Though Apple would recite her mother's teachings all day long she would never say exactly what had happened to her, other than that she had died.  "Fine then, go find a bush. But don't go far and rejoin the column as quick as you can!"

      Apple rode off and she was indeed not gone long before Jasper's thundering hooves heralded her return, waving something in her hand.

      "Look, look!" she announced excitedly. "We're far enough west you can find wild firebush!" she held out her hand, showing ten or so deep red-purple pods, shriveled and dried from the sun. "Now I can make us all some prairie-stew, chilly-style!"

      "Chilly style?" Meg asked, riding beside them. "Why would you make a hot stew chilly?"

      "Well, it's not really chilly, it's jus’ that it's called chilly because it'll warm you up when it gets chilly."

      "Doesn't hot stew do that normally?"

      "Well, certainlies, but if it's *really* chilly outside, chilly *really* warms you up inside, and if it's hot outside it makes you sweat enough you're chilly inside, and if its chilly outside and inside a little more chilly makes it hot inside and outside and if it's jus’ a chill in your head, but not anywhere else, chilly cures that right proper too."

      Eldest tried to process all that and gave up. "Apple, that makes no sense."

      "It makes a lot more sense when you eat it," she grinned mischievously. "I'll make proper plainswomen of the whole troop, you'll see!"

      "Don't you get tired of feeding us all, even when you don't have to? We could go to the mess tent."

      "Naw, I find I actually like carin’ for folk, as long as I, you know, actually care about the folk I'm carin’ for."

      It was certainly an education in how Apple came up with the meals she did. She rode along with the troop, chatting with whoever about whatever, but then she'd spy something and ride off, returning with wild onions, garlic, cactus-flower, lemongrass or even (since the desert was in bloom from the rains) wild mushrooms. Those would go into her saddlebags. So too did any rabbits, gophers or sage grouse unlucky enough to come within range of her slingshot.

      When the columns stopped for the evening it all went into a pot along with the ground firebush beans and simmered while Apple set up her 'prairie oven'. The oven was little more than two broad flat stones, a few bricks and section of clay pipe. As far as Eldest could tell, what happened next was sheer magic. Apple would pile coals from the fire under the makeshift little oven, and when it was 'hot enough to fry some spit' she'd tuck little hand-shaped flatbread loaves inside. From time to time, she'd add or remove coals and when it "smelled right" she would pop out delicious, golden-crusted, fluffy, utterly intoxicating bread. The stew would be ready not long after, and with a little clarified butter, the troop would dig in.

      As it happened Rose had pressed to first in line and wolfed down a hefty portion of the 'chilly'. Her initially savoring look changed almost comically to one of horror, practically panting, fingers desperately fumbling for her canteen.

      "Nope, yew don't want no water!" warned Apple, just as Rose took a hefty swig. "Water jus’ spreads the burn around..."

      Rose spewed out the water, face beet red, trying to control her breathing, great gasps of air huffing in and out. "It's too late for me," she gasped to all of them, red-faced. "Save yourselves!"

      "Naw, you'll be fine," Apple assured her, skipping over to offer her bread and clary-butter. "Bread cools the fire, so does milk or things what once was milk, like butter."

      Rose eagerly grabbed the bread and popped it desperately into her mouth to chew. The relief in her face was palpable, enough that she then made a grab at Apple, clearly intending to strangle the source of her misery. Apple, though, dodged gazelle-like and took refuge atop a boulder with her own bowl.

      "Ay-yup, you might want to take small bites at first," she noted, though she nonetheless wolfed hers down with a grin. "Takes a while to build up a true Plainswoman's palate."

      "I always heard the plainswomen were savages, and if this is what they have to eat, it's no wonder why!" Rose panted, glaring up at her.

      "Why, I reckon I do resemble that remark," Apple hooted, grinning down from her perch.

      "You can't stay up there forever, drummer-girl," Rose warned her. "I'll tan your hide like you tanned my tongue!"

      "Only if y'kin catch me!" teased Apple back, "but if it's really all that bad, y'kin always fall in line fer tucker at the 7th company mess."

      Rose's face fell, and she scowled. "First she tries to set me on fire, now she's trying to poison me," she complained, but slunk off to devour more bread, leaving her bowl untouched.

      Gingerly, Eldest tried hers. The stew was thick and richly flavored with mesquite, vegetables and meat... then the spice hit and she gasped, her tongue sizzling. Eyes watering, she tore off a bit of bread, cooling the burn and letting her take another bite.  "It's like trying to eat a porcupine, you have to go real slow and careful." she warned the others.

      May and Fawn refused to try theirs at all. Most of the others tried a bite or two, then ran out of bread and didn't dare eat more. Whisper, surprisingly, calmly ate hers and finished Rose's and May's besides.  But unlike almost any other meal Apple had prepared for them, there were plenty of leftovers.

      "That's not a matter," Apple told them cheerfully. "We kin have the rest fer breakfast, lunch and dinner again!" not in the least noticing the looks of terror her words engendered.

      The next morning, Eldest sent Apple with the morning report off to the Colonel, then addressed the troop.    

      "Our orders today are just general patrol and courier duties as needed. I want you to ride in pairs, learn the lay of the land, get familiar with the routes either north to Santi-Judith or south to Tradetown; we could be summoned either way, and the Colonel will want to know the best road to get there if we are. Now," she drawled, "Apple has asked that anyone patrolling keep an eye out for firebush. It seems that after last night's dinner she's all out of firebush pods."

      Groans and looks of horror followed this announcement, but Eldest smiled a wolfish smile and went on. "Apple wants you to look for firebush. I *also* want you to look for firebush. Any bushes you find, you are to strip of pods- and then dump them down the deepest, darkest gopher-hole you can possibly find. I want them put somewhere where Apple will never, ever, *ever* get her clever little hands on them." Laughter echoed down the line as Eldest expanded on that. "From this point on, please treat firebush pods as lethal weapons that must be denied to the enemy at all cost!"

Chapter Text

      While the Rangers patrolled, the rest of the 22nd set about transforming the ruined fort back into a military camp. Though the ditches and walls were eroded from the passage of time they still provided a foundation from which to start, saving a tremendous amount of labor. By nightfall the camp was taking shape, the ditches re-dug and walls piled back up, sentry towers set and tents laid out in neat rows. Though "loafing" was never an option in the Iron Regiment, light duties were clearly the order of the day as the Colonel allowed her women to rest and recover from the stresses of their forced march. However, the Colonel was not one to miss an opportunity to keep her troops in training, so a Queen's cup shooting competition was arranged, each troop vying for the highest score. Once she heard about it Apple would not be left out, and so it was a few days later Eldest found herself chatting with the drill instructor, Lieutenant Dia.

      Dia looked up at the tally sheets and sighed at Eldest. “Sixty-four Troops plus one in the Regiment, and yours is at the top of the marksmanship rolls. Again.”

      Inwardly pleased, Eldest nevertheless shrugged. “Well, we *are* Queen’s Rangers, ma'am. I’d have their hides if they weren’t at the top of the list. Besides, my troop is full strength and mostly veterans. That’s not true of most of the 22nd.”

      “True, true,” Dia scowled again at her sheets. “Nonetheless, I’m going to have to explain to the Colonel why an under-aged drummer-girl, shooting a rifle she can barely lift and that’s taller than she is, is outshooting half the adult women in the Regiment. I’m not looking forward to the conversation.”

      Eldest chuckled. “Apple really shot that well? She said she knew guns, but I never know what’s truth and what’s swagger with that girl.”

      “The armorer was impressed. She’s already talking about cutting down one of the Fillybranch six-shooter rifles into a carbine for her.”

      Eldest frowned. “Six quick shots, but a long reload time, jams easily with any dirt at all, and can chain-fire if you're not real careful keeping it clean."

      Dia shrugged. “All true. But at least she won’t have to stand on a soap box to reload it like she does with the muzzle-loaders. I wish we could get some of the new Wainwright .44’s”

      “They’re coming, I hear. The Queens have put in an order, anyway. Which regiment they’re issued to, however, is another story.”

      “So how is that drummer-girl of yours fitting in, really?"

      “I never looked to say this, but she’s fitting in quite well. She’s small but stronger and faster than she looks. What she lacks in size she makes up for in youthful enthusiasm. She’s good for morale, too. Even my most jaded veterans don’t dare complain about scut-work when Apple, who is half their size, does it without complaint. You're telling me she can fire a gun as well as an adult. She endures hardship at least as well. She’s quick to learn anything in the military arts, and responds better to discipline. She’s also a first-class forager. She’ll make a fine soldier when she’s grown.”

      “Do you really think that’s the best career for her?”

      “What else might you suggest?"

      You won’t want to hear it, but she ought to try for a whore.”

      “Ma’am!” Eldest scowled, aghast.

      Dia shrugged helplessly. “Well, she should. She’s pretty enough, with those lovely delicate features, but she’s got a lanky build and her hips are darned near as narrow as a boy’s. If she stays slender like she is now she’d earn far more wearing an ivory bone than she ever would wearing a uniform. Women would be falling over themselves to take her for a lover.”

      Eldest still scowled. The proposal actually made sense… Army life was a grind that wore down even the strongest. Unless you had a sister that made officer, or you made officer yourself, all the Army had to offer was an early death either from exhaustion, camp fever or some faceless enemy’s bullet. Apple had no sisters, no family at all but the little one of her troop. A better deal than starving to death, certainly, but not a life to be envied. Yet it still seemed wrong, in some strange way Eldest couldn’t quite put her finger on and it took a few moments to reason why. She considered, then shook her head to Dia. “Apple’s too kindhearted to make a whore.  To rise in that trade you have to be willing to climb from a poorer bed to a richer one, with a trail of broken hearts behind. She’s neither ambitious nor heartless enough to prosper as a whore.”

      “That’s a point,” conceded Dia.  “But unless she starts growing, and soon, she's going to be too small to survive Army life for long. The first camp fever to come along will put a period to her for sure."

Chapter Text

      The Colonel believed in keeping her troops busy and she was unhappy with the maps they had of their area of operations. Most of what they had dated to the Two-Dagger War or even older. Mapping and reconnaissance were Ranger jobs, so it had been a long, hard day and Nan's interruption was most unwelcome. "Blackberry just came by. There's trouble at the west gate, Colonel wants you there."

      "The Colonel?" Eldest shrugged on her jacket and tried to dust off the trail dirt. "What sort of trouble?"

      "I'm not sure exactly, but seems our good little Apple may have gone a little rotten."

      "Apple? What on earth trouble could she find in a camp like this?"

      "Once an Apple falls from the tree, it rolls down the hill too. Who knows where it will end up? But Blackberry said the Colonel looked very unhappy."

      Eldest hurried to the gate to find a morose Apple standing beside Jasper, who had been rigged up to a crude travois from his saddle straps. That right there was a testament to how far Apple had come with Jasper, that he tolerated the noisy travois dragging behind him. Heart sinking, Eldest also noticed the full-grown boar lashed to the travois, -clearly a fat domestic animal, not a wild peccary- and the Colonel standing right beside her, glowering over crossed arms.

      Trying not to think of the tasty ham and bacon the pig represented, she fetched up before the Colonel and saluted. "You sent for me, Ma'am?"

      "I did. Sergeant Eldest, did you understand the general's…and *my* orders regarding foraging?"

      Eldest swallowed. "I did, Ma'am."

      "And were those orders relayed adequately to your troopers, including a certain drummer girl, of whom we are both aware?"

      Eldest glowered at Apple, who visibly wilted. "They were. No foraging."

      The Colonel grunted and tapped the travois. "What, then, is the meaning of such an outrage?" she demanded.

      "An excellent question, Ma'am. Apple?" she snarled.

      Apple looked near tears, but set her jaw stubbornly. "Sergeant, your orders were no foraging on the Queensland. No one said anything about foraging Imomain land!"

      "You're claiming...that this is an Imomain pig?" asked Eldest, as stunned by impossibility of that as by Apple's brass tits at even trying to float such an excuse.

      Apple nodded. "It surely was. I was prospectin’ for firebush when I saw him rootin’ on the other side of the river. Well, he looked right dangerous to me, bein' an enemy pig an all, so I put a round in him and he dropped where he stood. Then I got to thinkin’ it would be a shame to let all that pork go to waste, so I took a rope and Jasper and I fetched him back right proper." 

      "So you'd have us believe you shot a pig across a hundred-yard-wide river, forded it even though it's running spring-high and impassable, then fetched a four-hundred pound pig carcass back all by your lonesome?" demanded the Colonel, her voice dripping with scorn and doubt.

      Apple looked at the Colonel with a wide-eyed innocence even Hope would have envied. "Well, pretty much, but I weren't alone. Jasper did all the heavy work, that bein' the point to havin' a horse an’ all."

      The Colonel's stony, disbelieving silence spoke volumes, but somehow Apple found the nerve to bluff it out. "Colonel, you wouldn't let an Imomain pig bite you, would you?" she implored.

      Long, long moments passed. Eldest had never thought she'd live to see the Colonel bend, but those wide eyes and apple cheeks were clearly too much even for the Iron Lady. Finally her visage cracked and she puffed out a laugh, barely smothering a snicker.

      "No," she chuckled at last, "no, I don't suppose I would." She rubbed her chin in amusement, contemplating the little miscreant before her.

      "However," she went on sternly, "I cannot have my troopers- even Queen's Ranger drummer-girls! invading other countries willy-nilly." She looked to Eldest. "Sergeant, your drummer-girl is fined half a pig for invading foreign soil in time of peace and without defiance sent. Do the butchery away from camp, I'll send Blackberry by to pick up half for the officer's mess."

      Eldest grinned, relief flooding her. "Yes ma'am, right away!" and motioned to Apple to follow.

Chapter Text

      Somehow Apple had scrounged enough ingredients to make a halfway decent glazing sauce for the pig, which cooked over the fire the better part of the next day. Even reduced by half the animal would feed the whole troop, with leftovers for the morrow. Fortunately she hadn't found many firebush pods before encountering the pig. As it was, the few she did find merely added a hot, tangy flavor to the meat that even Rose had to admit was delicious. Apple, though, complained bitterly that she needed ten times the number of pods she had. With a silent prayer of thanks to the gods, Eldest settled herself by Apple as the sun sank lower on the horizon.

      "I hope you realize, young Apple, how lucky you were the Colonel decided to swallow that wild tale of yours. She'd have been well within her rights to whip half the skin off your back, then drum you out of the regiment!"

      Apple nodded somberly. "I'm plumb ashamed, Sergeant. I was only thinkin’ of pork, not that I was invading foreign soil."

      Eldest frowned. "You're already off the hook, little fish. No more pretending. Confession time. Where *did* you shoot this particular beast? The Wheeler farm?"

      Apple turned that doe-eyed gaze on her. "No. It was on the Imomain side of the river, jus’ like I tol' you. You don't think I'd lie to the *Colonel* do you?"

      "Apple, there is no ford within thirty miles of where we're posted and even the farther ones are flooded, impassable, and guarded by thousands of women besides. Are you telling me you *swam* that river?"

      Those wide blue eyes looked into hers long moments. "Jus’ a moment, Sergeant," she said, and trotted off to her tent, returning shortly with the little hymnal she read by lamplight. Solemnly she placed one hand on the book, raising her right hand in oath. "Eldest, I swear before the gods and my mother's soul that I shot that boar exactly where I told you; on the far side of the river. I took Jasper there to fetch him back. And neither Jasper nor I walked on water to do it."

      Eldest stared back, her brain lurching into sudden, horrified overdrive. Of all her troopers, Apple was easily the most devout. Moreover, the love and respect Apple carried for her mother had been evident from their earliest meeting. There was no way a ford had magically appeared overnight. But there was no way Apple would lie on a Holy Book or using her mother's name, either. And if there *was* a ford there, it was unguarded, a dagger aimed at the unsuspecting heart of the Queen's forces. Little ice spiders ran up and down her veins.

      "How," she asked faintly, "did you even know a ford was there?"

      "Well, you could sort of see it, with the water runnin’ fast as it is. Besides, there were hoofprints in the sand, someone must use it."

      Heart certainty. The show the Imomains were staging at the fords was just that. A show, a distraction designed to pull their main strength away. Away from here and now. She cursed blasphemously, drawing an appalled look from Apple. To be gifted critical intelligence and not realize it; could she even call herself a Ranger after this?

      "Raaaaaannnngerrrrrss!" Her tone and volume brought the entire troop up short. "I want every trooper saddled, armed and ready to ride in ten minutes, and that was five minutes ago! Bring every scrap of ammunition you can carry! Move, girls!"

      The women scattered with gratifying swiftness while she hurriedly scrawled warning notes to the Colonel and Major Kanga. "Apple, *where* was that ford?!" she demanded.

      Still looking shocked, Apple stammered, "North and west, in the area where the river does those big lazy bends."   

      "Which bend? They go on for miles."

      "I- I'm not sure, Sergeant. I was too busy looking for firebush to take much account of where I was. I could *show* you where, I'm sure of that, but I couldn't tell you which particular bend."

      Eldest clutched the notes in her hand. Normally she'd send Apple as messenger, but now she needed her as a guide. Fawn was just coming up, leading her horse, already saddled. Young, unblooded and anxious to prove herself, but a decent tracker. The last decided it. "Fawn, you're courier today. Take these, one to the Colonel, then one to Major Kanga. If anyone tries to stop you, tell them it's an emergency, and it's from me. If they still try to stop you after that, shoot them."

      "Shoot them?!" Fawn echoed, googly-eyed.

      "Threaten them first, but shoot them if you have to. Get these into the highest officer's hands you can find. After that, unless they have other orders for you, lead them along our trail as best you can. We'll be heading to the lazy bend section of the river, we'll do our best to mark the trail as we go."

      "If it's a battle, I can fight!" protested Fawn, but Eldest glared her down.

      "You can follow orders, Ranger! Now go!"

      Fawn fled just as the rest of the troop assembled. Fortunately Meg had had the presence of mind to have Eldest's horse saddled as well as her own, and she tossed Eldest her carbine as she strode up. Snatching it out of the air, Eldest vaulted to the saddle, slipping it into the saddle holster before turning to her mystified women. "If Apple's right, there's a ford we didn't know about," she told them curtly. "If we're lucky, the Immies don't know about it either. I'm betting that they do. Now we ride! Apple, which way?" she demanded.

      The troop thundered out of the gate, startling the sentries as they raced west, towards the river. Apple took the lead, angling them north and west along dry and not-so-dry arroyos, heading for the river. All the while Eldest's heart pounded in her chest, trying to force down the butterflies that kept rising in her stomach. A full day, nearer a day and a half. If there was a ford there, and if the Immies knew about it, why hadn't they attacked already? The moon had been full three nights ago, perfect for a surprise attack. If they knew about it, why wait? The thought was almost reassuring… except Eldest knew the Immies wouldn’t start shifting forces until they were sure they could cross. Moving too early would be easily spotted by scouts or spies. And while the river level was dropping rapidly since the rains stopped, they were still running high and fast. Just because Apple could get a horse across a ford didn't mean the average trooper could. Heaven only knew where Apple's tall tales ended and her real life began, but she *was* good with horses. Hopefully there was still time. Hopefully she was mistaken. Hopefully... She had never found it wise to trust to hope.

      Once beyond the trampled dirt of the encampment and the hardpans that surrounded it, following Apple's trail became much easier. She'd been dragging a heavy travois, after all, and the wind hadn't had time to completely erase the trail. Fawn shouldn't have too much trouble guiding the rest of the regiment in their wake.

      They crested a hill, a floodbank of the river, just before the river valley itself, and Eldest's heart sank. The far bank was alive with soldiers in the desert cream of the Imomain Imperial Army. Across the river in a narrow line were hundreds more, but they were snarled behind a six-pounder gun that had slewed sideways in the swift current, almost sweeping it away. A tight knot of women were working desperately with ropes, trying save the gun without being swept away themselves. Quickly backing her horse behind the hill and motioning the others to do likewise, Eldest dismounted and lay prone, peering over the crest of the embankment.

      To her growing horror, the Imomains already had two six-pounders across and were making an earth-and-wood emplacement for the battery, based on a rammed-earth hardpoint left over from a previous conflict. They were well on their way to establishing a fortified bridgehead that would be very difficult -if not impossible- to take back.

      Steeling her nerve, she forced herself to study the Immomain positions clinically. The women across the river were in a very narrow line. There was no way that was a natural ford. The swiftly-flowing river flowed as high as the women's hips, and even as she watched a woman lost her footing, her faint scream reaching all the way to Eldest's ears as her form was swept downstream. Though the woman was an enemy, Eldest hoped she could swim; then realized it wouldn't make much difference whether she could or not. The rapids downstream would see to that. The Imomains were in a tight spot, and there were only a handful of Imomain women on the Queensland side of the river. Give them time to fortify their bridgehead and they could pour troops across, then surge north and south to destroy General Falkirk's positions from behind. But right here and right now, they were vulnerable.

      She eased back and surveyed her troop. Despite their reputation, Rangers were not frontline troops. They were scouts, skirmishers and flankers, but the value of the information they gathered was always worth far more than any weight of lead they might add to a battle. Yet right here and right now, her women were the only ones available.

      Her first duty was to get the news back to the Colonel. She'd sent warning notes with Fawn, but those were speculative, maybes and what-ifs. The knowledge that the Imomains were across the river in strength was worth more than any of their lives. Who could she spare? Apple, of course, but this was too important to trust to a single underage messenger. Her eyes settled on Sarah. Young, unblooded and scared, but an excellent rider.

      "Apple, Sarah," she motioned to them. "You're to ride back to camp as quickly as possible. Warn the Colonel and anyone else you can find that the Immies are already across the river, and are fortifying a bridgehead. They have at least two 6-pounder guns across already, and..." she peered over the embankment, "judging from the hoofprints, a least a company of cavalry as well. You're to stay together unless you get intercepted. If you are intercepted, split up and proceed alone. Don't fight unless you absolutely have to, and if you do have to, shoot to kill. Your overriding mission is to get this intelligence to the Colonel. Nothing else matters. Do you understand?"

      Two solemn, frightened nods greeted her words. "Then go. We're counting on you. Tell the Colonel our troop will hold them as long as we can."

      As Sarah and Apple slipped off, she turned to the rest of her women. "It's time to buy our Ranger pride. Check your loads. We're going to charge down there, take that fucking emplacement and make it our own. If we make it, loose your horses, but make sure any ammo you have comes with you. We're going to need every bullet."

      Under cover of the embankment they mounted. Eldest checked her carbine, making sure the ball was tight and the percussion cap sound. What she wouldn't give for a repeating rifle now... but of course, that was what her revolvers were for. Around her, her troopers formed up like a flight of vengeful angels, the steely click of hammers being cocked. She loved them, loved them like family, like sisters, and she was leading them to battle, perhaps to death. It made no sense and yet her heart near burst with pride at the sight of them. Taking a long, deep breath to steady her nerves, she raised one arm in signal. "Charge!"

      They crested the hill with yell and thundered down the embankment, the golden light of the westering sun coloring them as the astonished Immomain women working on the emplacement looked up in surprise and horror. They threw down their shovels and ran for their guns, but it was far, far too late for that. Eldest fired her carbine, her heart iron as the woman she'd targeted flung up her hands and fell face-first into the dirt. More shots rang out, more women fell, and suddenly they were among the gun crew, pistols spurting fire, sabers clashing. Whisper sabered down the last of them, and suddenly there were no more opponents, the few survivors running for the river. She took a quick inventory of her women. Miraculously, only Catherine was hurt, and that a graze. "Turn those guns around," she barked, "We'll give them a taste of their own grape!"

      They flowed into the emplacement, saddlebags of ammo coming with them, their now-useless horses turned out as muskets were laid over the crest of the stone and rammed-earth walls. Suddenly bullets began arriving from across the river, buzzing like angry bees as they smacked into their little redoubt. It was almost like a rain of lead, but the emplacement had been built to withstand just such an attack and as the six-pounders turned to face their former owners she heard screams from the women caught on the narrow causeway. Panicking, they abandoned the ropes and all efforts to save the slewed gun, which tumbled off the causeway and was lost to the river. Some tried to go back, others tried to swim for it as the muzzles of their own cannon turned to stare straight down the causeway.

      Her women were not artillerywomen. But a cannon was essentially just a big muzzle-loader and that they were familiar with. Meg hurriedly threaded a friction primer into the vent of the cannon and pulled its cotton string. The primer went 'pft!' but no explosion followed. "What the hell?!" growled Meg, lancing the touchhole and peering inside. "Unloaded! What kind of stupid bitch sets up a bridgehead with unloaded cannon?!!"

      More bullets smacked into the emplacement, sending them all ducking as Catherine rifled through the chests that had been haphazardly stacked there. "The kind that just brought them across a flooded river. Most of this powder's wet, dammit!"

      "See if you can find any that's dry," ordered Eldest. She peered through a small embrasure between the stones. Repositioning the guns had done one good thing at least, it had cleared the causeway of women in record time. But with the cannon silent, it was only a matter of time before the Immomain women realized what the problem was. Then they'd come swarming.

      "Rose, Nan, Herra," she snapped, naming their three best shots, and also the women with actual rifles, not smoothbore carbines. "Sniper duty. Take shots as you see them. Diana, Becca, May, reload for the riflewomen. Everyone else, targets of opportunity, but don't waste carbine shots unless they're halfway across the river. All of you, keep your heads down!”

      Her riflewomen settled themselves into niches, their sisters in arms piling up rocks to give them as much protection as possible. Rose's rifle cracked and a woman on the far bank fell. Rose handed the rifle down to Becca, who began the laborious reload process. That was always the problem with muzzleloading rifles. Accurate shots, but too long a reload between them. Other shots rang out, and the women on the far bank scrambled for cover. The rain of lead from the Imomain side never stopped, but it slackened noticeably as they showed they could bite back. Becca handed Rose the rifle, who took it but a moment before there was another crack and it was handed down again.

      "We should have asked Apple to leave her Fillybranch with us," growled Rose. "I could use six shots just about now."

      Eldest shook her head, watching the Immies scurrying about the opposite bank like angry inferno ants. "Hers is cut down to child size. You'd never be accurate with it, and if she and Sarah do encounter any Immies on the way back, I wanted her to have something to shoot with."

      Nan's rifle cracked and her voice cracked out with it. "They're forming cavalry over there!"

      Eldest peeked through her sight-hole, and saw the movement Nan had spotted. "Rifles, concentrate on the cavalry. Shoot anyone who looks like an officer. When they get to the river, rifles target women, muskets target horses. Emma, Hope," she named her worst shots, "After you empty your carbines, use your pistols. Keep sending lead their way, but use different embrasures each time."

      "A pistol hit at this range would be the wildest stroke of luck!" Emma protested.

      "I know that. I want them to think we have more women here than we really do. We've got to convince them trying to cross the river is suicide."

      "Trying to cross the river *is* suicide!" snarled Rose.

      "Here they come!" warned Nan.

      Three times the Imomain cavalry formed up, four abreast, to charge across the river, and three times their guns murdered the lead women or their horses. It scarcely mattered which; once the horse fell or reared the woman off, the merciless river swept them away.

      "Dammit, can't they see this is futile?!" cried Hope during a lull.

      "It isn't." Sweat trickled down Eldest's cheek, mixed with blood from a rock fragment that had been chipped by a round impacting their little shelter. "We only have so much ammo. If they're willing to lose the women, they can last us out, then swamp us. Unless the Colonel and the rest of the 22nd get here soon, we're cooked."

      While they waited, they checked ammo levels. Despite the extra they'd grabbed, they were down to less than a hundred rounds per woman. Across the river came the boom of a cannon, the swish of a shell, and the solid thwack of the ball hitting the rammed-earth exterior of their redoubt. Fortunately, all the Immies seemed to have were four and six pounders with grape or solid shot, and it was precisely those weapons that the redoubt was built to stop. If they'd faced mortars, heavier shot or any of the new exploding shells, this little fracas would have been over very quickly.

      The Imomains dithered. The troop used the respite to bandage wounds from rock shrapnel and ricochets. Catherine finished going through the powder charges for the cannon, carefully emptying the silk bags and laying out the powder, trying to salvage any that was dry.

      "The first three chests are a total loss, soaked," she reported. "The last chest only got a little wet, and I've put together the driest of it. I've got eight charges I'm pretty sure will fire... another three or four, maybes... and that's it." she finished grimly.

      "Better than nothing," nodded Eldest. "Good work, Cat. Get the best charges ready, but don't load 'em yet. We don't know whether we'll want the solid shot or the grape, so keep our options open."

      "They're bringing wagons up?" reported Nan, puzzled.

      Eldest peered through a tiny rock-piled embrasure. Sticking one's head above the wall was now tantamount to suicide. She wondered just how soon a bullet would make the one-in-a-million transit through a peephole and she would lose a woman to the resulting head shot. She saw at once what Nan was talking about, the Immies were bringing two wagons up towards the ford... wagons with heavy wooden walls hastily constructed over their fronts. Eldest cursed. "I do believe," she snarled, "that the Immies have just reinvented the siege mantlet." She looked over to Catherine. "Load the cannons, solid shot."

      Whisper put down her rifle and hurried to assist. Whisper was another one of her oddities, a private well into her thirties. In her case, though, she was actually frozen in rank, committing some sin not bad enough to get her cashiered, but bad enough she was blackballed for life. Banging around the whole army before washing up in the Rangers, she was a source of every sort of military knowledge but she rarely spoke due to a throat scarred by a sword cut. Judging from the assurance with which she supervised the loading, at least some of that time had been spent in the artillery.

      Meanwhile, the Immies were slowly pushing the wagons onto the narrow causeway that forded the river. They must have weighted them with rocks to get them to hold in the current, and though they couldn't see them, Eldest knew there were dozens if not hundreds of women sheltering behind them. Snatching glances through embrasures, Eldest could see puffs of dirt and occasional splinters from where her women's rounds impacted the wooden mantlet, but the rounds were too light to penetrate the heavy timbers. "Don't waste the ammo," she snapped. "They wouldn't be trusting their lives to those things unless they'd already tested them against their own bullets."

      "Cannons loaded," reported Meg. "We can move them up any time."

      Eldest checked again. The wagons were obviously unwieldy, balking and stopping at every opportunity. It wouldn't take much damage to disable them entirely. That was an opportunity in itself, she realized. If they were disabled on the causeway, they'd be an obstacle to any further attempts to cross. "Whisper," she motioned, beckoning her over. "If we let them get halfway across, how accurate can you be with these cannon?"

      Whisper considered, then strained her scratchy voice to answer. "At seventy yards, these conditions, this crew? The first ball will go somewhere in a three-foot circle of where it's aimed. The next ball will go in a two-foot circle. Subsequent balls will go in a one-foot circle."

      Eldest nodded. “Let them get halfway across, then do your best to disable them; take a wheel or an axle if you can. You have eight shots, maybe twelve. Don't waste them.”

      Whisper nodded as Eldest turned to the rest of the troop. “Troopers, this is likely their last drop of spit. Make those shots count!"

      "Their last drop of spit, or ours?" murmured Meg as they loaded their muskets, glimpsing the painfully slow progress of the siege wagons through stone embrasures.

      "One or the other," agreed Eldest quietly, out of earshot of the rest of the women. "Now would be a good time for the 22nd to show up."

      "Gun one, forward!" rasped Whisper and they lifted the cannon's trail, running it forward to a gap in the redoubt. Whisper took a sighting, hurriedly adjusted the elevation of the gun, then everyone covered their ears as she pulled the primer cord.

      The concussion was a literal slap in the face as the cannon rolled backwards, choking smoke drifting east under a slight breeze. Eldest anxiously peered through a peephole; the first shot, on the left wagon, had gone high and a little left of where Whisper had probably aimed it, penetrating the heavy wooden timbers and doubtless sending a shower of lethal splinters at the women behind.  She could hear screams and moans from across the water, even as her women brought up the second cannon while Bea supervised reloading the first. Whisper primed, sighted, adjusted and sighted again. Satisfied, she pulled the friction primer and the cannon thundered, rolling back in an acrid cloud of gun smoke. Ears ringing, Eldest risked a peek. Though Whisper had only promised a two-foot circle on her second shot, this one had clearly hit the forward axle, the wagon collapsing to the left. The powerful river current caught the wagon and tumbled it off the causeway, dumping its load of ballast rock into the river and exposing the women behind it. Those women quickly sheltered behind the second mantlet but not before her Rangers had laid a withering fire into them. As packed as they were it was almost impossible for a bullet to miss something and she had to close her ears to the screams. Queensland hadn't asked for an invasion.

      The other wagon had halted even as her women labored to reload the first gun. A good crew could load and fire twice or even three times in a minute, but her women were Rangers, not artillerywomen. Cursing, they struggled to get the cannon loaded and positioned for Whisper to sight it in. Rolling the first gun forward, Whisper's next shot was easier, against an unmoving target. She placed that round almost dead center and a little low on the mantlet, evidently trying to hit the axle tongue and thus pitch the wagon forward, blocking the causeway. This shot wasn't as touched by luck as her second, though, so it took two more shots before the second wagon groaned and collapsed, this time on the upstream side. The powerful current caught it and slewed it sideways across the causeway; not totally blocking it but certainly cutting down on the available space. Most of the women sheltering behind the mantlet had already started their retreat, but her troop still sent another harrowing barrage at them to hurry them along.

      Hope fired a final round and cried "I'm out! Who still has ammo?"

      "Cease fire!" Eldest barked, upbraiding herself for not conserving sooner. "Check your haversacks, redistribute and balance ammo. Meg," she called, "I want a count- what's left?"

      "Yes, Sergeant!" Meg acknowledged, hurrying to confer with the others. Eldest watched grimly as the last of the women retreated off the causeway, many hauling wounded or dead comrades.

      "Please," she willed them. "Give it up. The river isn't worth dying for."

      Unfortunately, the way the women were reforming on the opposite bank suggested they weren't beaten yet.

      After a short huddle and ammo swap, Meg came reported in. "The three rifles are all loaded; we have seventeen spare rounds between them," she reported quietly. "The muskets are all loaded; there are thirty-nine reloads, total, for them. Every revolver is loaded; each woman has three full reloads for what she carries, and we have eleven spare rounds after that. Cannon number one is loaded with solid shot; cannon two is empty; we have two good reloads left for them, plus the four Cat says are iffy. After that," she grimaced, "we're down to swords and knives."

      Eldest cursed under her breath. Her women had worked a miracle, and it wasn't enough. That wasn't even enough ammo to cover their retreat. She ought to pull out. She ought to pull out right now, while the Immomains were still in disarray. She ought to... but then the Immomains would swarm across the river, recapture the strong point Eldest and her troop occupied. She'd be sure to spike the guns already here before they left, but the Immies had plenty of guns across the river. Give them time, and good women would die trying to reclaim what her Rangers had abandoned.

      "What about the artillery crew's weapons?" she demanded. "Can we salvage anything from them?"

      There'd been about dozen women in the crew they'd overwhelmed. Some had fled, the bodies of those who hadn't had been unceremoniously dumped outside the redoubt when they took it. May dashed out despite the occasional shots that still rang out from across the river, returning with a brace of muskets, a few cartridge boxes and three pistols. The calibers of Immomain muskets didn’t match their own, but it would fit the weapons it was designed for, and the powder itself didn’t care what gun it was put in. Their own smoothbores could be loaded with river gravel if nothing else. The cartridges were distributed, about eighty in all, the pistols given over to women who were short. They could hold, Eldest told herself. Hold just a little longer.

Her conviction didn’t last long. Glancing across the river, she could see where the Immies were building hasty fieldworks, bringing up more and bigger guns at last. Soon their little shelter wouldn’t be safe. That tore it. They’d done all they could, and through no fault of their own, they’d come up short.

      Heart sinking, she turned to her women. “Load the other cannon, grapeshot. We’re going to shoot them both, then pull out. The moment the cannons fire, I want all of you to run straight behind us, over the embankment.”

      Dismay registered in their faces. The lee of the redoubt would shelter them until they got to the embankment, but the odds were slim that they’d make it over without losing a woman, probably more than one, to the Imomain snipers on the opposite bank.

      “Whisper,” she continued, “I want you to fire them both together; put it across the river, wherever you think will do the most good. We'll spread and light that last good charge at the same time. Hopefully the smoke from all that will obscure you long enough to make it over the bank. Once you’re on the other side, you’ll be safe.”

      “Once *we’re* on the on the other side?” asked Meg slowly. “What will you be doing?”

      “I’ll be spiking the cannons. I don’t want you to wait, the smoke will only hide you for a few moments.”

      “Then what the hell is going to hide you, when it’s your turn to run?!”

      “I’ll spread the remaining charges, and light them. There’ll be plenty of smoke.”

      “Only if they actually burn, Cat said they were iffy!”

      “Do you have any better ideas?”

      Meg stared at her, hard-faced. “No,” she conceded grudgingly.

      “Then you have your orders, Corporal," Eldest snapped. "This discussion is over. Get the troop ready to run." Turning away from her corporal, Eldest snatched up the spikes and hammer from the gunlocker, mentally rehearsing the movements she would have to make to spike the cannon touchholes, making them useless.

      It didn't take long. Whisper crouched by the guns, with two women at each tailstock ready to move them up. The rest of her women huddled by the back of redoubt, ready to run. Steeling herself, she glanced across the river. The sun was setting in earnest now, casting long shadows and bathing the scene in reddish gold.

      "Whenever you're ready, Whisper," she ordered. "We go on your word."

      Whisper took a deep breath, but then looked up, puzzled. "What's that?" she croaked, listening intently. 

      Eldest drew breath to ask what the hell she meant, but then she heard it too. A faint rolling drumming sound that grew louder by the moment, growing nearer. She almost melted in relief. "I do believe that the cavalry has arrived to save the day. Sarah and Apple must have gotten through!"

      Smiles flashed throughout the redoubt, eagerly peeping over the walls... which made it all the more crushing when the soldiers that poured down the embankment a few hundred yards downstream wore the desert cream of the Imomain Imperial army, at least a hundred mounted women, riding hard.

      "Dear gods,” Eldest found herself praying as the cavalry company turned north, heading straight for the causeway and their little redoubt. Without orders, her women loosed a ragged volley at the incoming troops. Eldest cursed; that volley would have been better served waiting a few moments more to get them into better range, but she didn’t blame them. The tactical situation was already as bad as it could get; one volley, more or less, would make no difference. Running was out of the question now; they would die where they stood.

      Though not particularly accurate, the volley did one good thing, throwing the front rank of the approaching cavalry into confusion. Uncertain of who or what was shooting at them, they recoiled, retreating in disorder, trying to protect their center.   

      “Whisper,” she snapped. “Get the guns turned ninety degrees, make sure they can see those muzzles!”

      As the horsewomen pulled back out of effective range the gun muzzles rolled forward, clear in their menace. She could see the ripple of dismay in the Cavalry company that faced them and felt a grim satisfaction. ‘That’s right you bitches,’ she mentally snarled at them. ‘You’ll get us in the end but by the gods you will pay a high price when you do!’

      “Gun one’s still loaded with solid shot,” murmured Meg.

      Eldest nodded. The solid shot was far from ideal for this, grapeshot was what was called for. But the only way to safely unload a cannon was to fire it, and they had just one good charge left. “It will have to serve,” she murmured back.

      “Sergeant?” called Hope, puzzled. “Are they… surrendering?”

      Three riders were coming forward, a white shirt strung up a lance pole before them.

      Eldest shook her head, “Truce flag,” she said automatically. Though it made no sense… Between the forces across the river and the cavalry this side the Imomains had more than enough women swamp them. Yes, the menace of the guns was intimidating but they could only point in one or two directions. Eldest would have sent riders over the embankment, assaulted the redoubt from four sides. Yes, they’d lose women before bringing the Rangers down, but not even all that many. Hit fast and hard, as the Rangers themselves had done in taking the redoubt in the first place. Yet the Imomain cavalry commander was clearly coming forward to parley.

      “I need something white,” she called back, but Rose was already halfway out of her shirt, which she quickly strung up on the pole of one of the cannon’s scraper tools.

      “What the hell are they thinking?” Rose asked as she handed the contraption to her. “They outnumber us ten to one, and we’re almost out of ammo!”

      Why indeed? Then it clicked. “They don’t know that. Girls, keep your heads down! All they know is that we’ve been standing off their whole goddamn army. Maybe they think there’s thirty, forty women in here. If they have signals with the forces on the other side, they may well be exaggerating our numbers too.”

      Rose nodded, then stiffened. “That’s why the parley. They want to know what they’re facing. If they see a sergeant, they’ll know they’re facing a troop or a file at most. Get your jacket off, Sergeant. And give yourself a promotion.”

      Eldest nodded, stripping off her jacket and its betraying insignia. “Captain or lieutenant, do you think?”

      “Lieutenant. There’s no way they’ll believe a whole company is here, but with a lieutenant, could be a file or a column or even a short company. Keep them guessing.”

      With a quick nod, Eldest took the truce flag, climbing up to stand atop the wall, fear filling the pit of her stomach. Fully exposed, she was easy meat for snipers on both sides of the river, but the Imomains had begun the truce and the Imomains set much in store by honor- by their own definition of it, at any rate.

      “That’s far enough!” she warned the approaching riders. They reined up, within easy shouting distance. All three bore the casual arrogance of the Hildalga and seemed to be at pains to show it, but their fine uniforms were soiled by hard riding and their eyes reflected uncertainty, darting glances that betrayed their nervousness. The middle one straightened in the saddle. “I am Ava de la Plata, Countess de Bejar. Is there a gentlewoman who will speak for you Queensland devils?”

      “I’m Eldest Ranger, lieutenant of Rangers, 7^th company, 1^st regiment of the Queen’s Own.”

      The Imomain officer sniffed in disdain. “I asked if there were any gentlewomen present,” she said, clearly dismissing Eldest and her common blood.

      “We Queenslanders are not gentle with trespassers and invaders. I’m the best you’re going to get.”

      “Very well. You have fought well, lieutenant, but further resistance will result only in the useless deaths of you and your women. I am empowered to accept your surrender.”

      “And I’m empowered to accept yours. You’re trapped here, countess, and it’s only a matter of time before more Queensland forces arrive. Your invasion is finished. If you wish to spare lives, start with those of your own troopers.”

      “Ah,” she scoffed, “the mouse roars. You are expecting reinforcements? From the messengers you sent perhaps? They will be reporting to no one.”

      Eldest’s gut wrenched. “You’re a poor liar, countess.”

      “Am I?” The woman gestured, and another rider, riding double, detached herself from the massed company downstream. The rider trotted forward and Eldest realized with a shock that the woman that swayed in front of the Imomain trooper was Sarah. She'd evidently put up one hell of a fight; her once pretty face was blotched, bloody and bruised, both eyes swollen shut, with a clearly broken nose. One arm dangled at an odd angle, obviously broken as well. She was gagged and seemed barely conscious.

      “This one at least is alive. Which is more than I can say for the other.”

      “Bitch!” she snarled at the Imomain officer.

      “You are fighting for nothing, lieutenant. Will you throw away your women’s lives for nothing?” 

      At the sound of Eldest’s voice Sarah forced one bloodshot eye open, a pleading look in that eye trying to convey… something. Pleading for rescue? She couldn’t speak, of course. They’d gagged her. That detail nagged at Eldest’s brain. Why would it be necessary to gag her? Wouldn’t it be more effective if she could plead for her own life? Eldest smiled grimly. Poker was one of her favorite amusements, and Sarah was very easy to read.

      “You *are* a poor liar, countess. You got the one, but not the other, didn’t you? You got the heavier rider on the slower horse; but little one got away from you, didn’t she?”

      It wasn’t much of a flinch, but it was there before the countess snapped, “you delude yourself!”

      “Never play poker, countess, you have more tells than a tenderfoot. The rest of our regiment will be arriving soon. Whatever your plan was, you’ve failed.”

      “I have not failed yet,” snarled the countess.

       Eldest forced confidence she didn’t feel. Bluff. She reached for the quiet space she fell back on when holding a busted straight against aces showing. Time to raise the pot. “One woman behind a wall is worth three in front of it. That makes this an even fight,” she lied. “Even if you win- and you might not- I doubt there will be a dozen of you hale and hearty at the end of it.”

      “Enough!” The countess spat, made a chopping gesture. “We can take your pathetic strong point, lieutenant. You know that. I know that. I am a noblewoman and murder sits ill with me, but I promise you, if you force me to order an attack, your own woman,” she pointed to Sarah,” will be at the head of the charge. She will die by your own guns. And if by chance any of your women survive, I swear by Santi Imomani herself I will shoot them with my own hand. Is that what you want?! You will surrender, now!”

      A grim, cold feeling settled in the pit of her stomach. Raise and counter-raise. Time to call. A sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, she glanced down at her women in the redoubt. “Rose,” she said quietly, “hand me up your rifle.”

      The rifle was passed up to her and a shudder of consternation went through the Imomain women, all the more so when she leveled it at Sarah’s heart. “Sarah,” she said, loudly, so they could all hear. “I’m sorry.”

      Sarah looked at her and slowly nodded, closing her eye and taking a deep breath.

      “Wait!” called the countess desperately. “You do not need to do this!”

      Eldest gritted her teeth. One of them needed to fold… and Eldest knew she had the losing hand. “What else might you suggest then, seeing as neither of us are prepared to surrender?”

      The countess took a deep breath. “I will bargain. You will permit my company to cross the river unmolested and return to Imomain soil. That’s what you want, isn’t it? In return, you may have your trooper back… and you and your women will live.”

      Palpable relief flooded Eldest, like a pardon received on the steps to execution, but to show it meant tipping her hand. She could blow it all if she looked too eager to take salvation.

      “Allowing you to cross means allowing you close to my position. Close enough to take it. How do I know you’ll keep your word?”

      “You insult me! I am Hidalga!”

      “And I am not a fool. Release Sarah to us, now. Then you’ll be permitted to cross.”

      “Give up my only leverage? How do I know you’ll keep *your* word?”

      “Now you insult me. I am a Queen’s Ranger!’

      “You’re an untrustworthy Queensland bitch, no more, no less!”

      Eldest considered. Bluffing only took you so far. If she forced the countess to attack she had no doubt her grim promise would be fulfilled. There was a strangely desperate edge to the woman’s voice. Aside from the deaths of herself and her troop, that would leave the Immies with the strong point and a bridgehead. She was under no illusions about her capacity to hold the redoubt in the face of a company-sized cavalry attack. She had neither the women nor the ammunition to do much but die heroically. If she let the Immies cross, though, she could still keep them from crossing back easily. The river would be her ally, then. The big guns they were setting up on the other side could take out the redoubt, but she and her women could still snipe from the other side of the riverbank as long as they had ammo to do so. The 22nd *had* to get here soon. She needed to buy time. Letting the company cross was the only way to do so. Guiltily, she knew that was also the only option that let them live.

      “Very well,” she shouted down to the Imomain countess. “Since neither of us trusts the other, you, personally, will stand with Sarah by that bush there,” she nodded at a thorny river bush near the crossing. “I will have a rifle trained at your heart while your troop crosses. At the first sign of treachery, if so much as a single finger touches a trigger, I will end you. Once your women are across, you will release Sarah, and you will be permitted to cross. You’ll have to trust me for that, but more than that I can’t do!”

      “Very well! I accept your terms!” the countess snapped back, her quick acquiescence surprising even Eldest. Dismounting, she went by the bush, pistol in hand. Sarah was lowered from the horse in front of the woman, a pistol to her head. The terms were passed back and the cavalry troop walked forward in a mass, while sweat beaded Eldest’s brow, half expecting the fatal charge, even as she kept a steady bead on the Imomanin woman. The troop quickly formed a column four across, with a tight knot around a group of women riding double, evidently bearing wounded comrades.

      ‘Good’, thought Eldest. ‘Leave with your tails between your legs.’

      There was a snarl as the Imomain company threaded its way around the disabled wagon on the causeway. Eldest herself never took her eyes off the Imomain commander but Rose appraised her of every movement.

      “They’re filing around the wagon,” she reported. “That big knot just dissolved… a lot of women riding double. Some of them must be plainswomen mercenaries, that’s long braids on two of ‘em. Yeah, definitely wounded women there. Wonder if they already met the 22nd?”

      “They must have, if they have that many wounded. But where the hell is the 22nd?”

      “Since when does infantry outdistance cavalry? They’ll be here. We just need to keep the Immies off our shores just a little longer.”

      There were no tricks; the company filed across the river in good order and as the last one reached the opposite shore the countess removed her pistol from Sarah’s head and holstered it with a flourish.

      “I suppose now I see just how much a Queen’s Ranger’s word is worth,” she announced, with an odd timbre of triumph in her voice.

      “You do. See that you lay a straight trail out of here. If you’re still on that causeway in ten minutes I’ll shoot you down, truce or no truce!”

      With a dismissive flip of her hand the countess swung up her horse. “I will. Believe me, lieutenant, Queensland holds nothing of value to us now.” With that, she threaded her mount over the treacherous river crossing while they rushed to assist Sarah, hauling her into the redoubt and taking off her gag.      

      “Bey, grls, ya biss me?” she grinned a sickly, bloody grin, spitting the cloth of the gag out. “Thake, thake es’y onna arram, hurtz!”

      Hope was already at Sarah’s side assessing the worst of her injuries, her normally mild speech a torrent of cusses. Eldest kept her eye and Rose’s rifle on the countesses’ back, itching to put a millie-ball in it. It was tempting; but by all the gods and the mothers too, the word of a Queen’s Ranger did mean something and the countess had kept her side of the deal.

`     There were muted cheers from the Imomain side as the countess reached the opposite bank. Almost immediately the Imomain units drawn up facing them began pulling back, back over their own embankment. It looked like they really were giving up. Relaxing only slightly, she popped down into the redoubt, where Hope was busy splinting Sarah’s arm. Hope must have gotten some laudanum in her, she looked a little less grey with pain, though she still whimpered as the broken bone was realigned.

      “Sweet mothers, Sarah. You must have put up one hell of a fight!”

      Sarah shook her head. “Nob breally,” she wheezed through the pain. “Appl’ n’ I ran inta dem, den dey chase us, m’ horse c’n go n’ further. I hell’em up, den surrender. Notso bad. Den d’ones chasin’ Appl’ come ba’k reel mad. Den dey beats da shi’ outta me.”

      It took Eldest a few moments to piece Sarah’s tale together. “They did this *after* you surrendered?” she demanded, white-faced.

      “Oh yahs. ‘Bout I tink I save m’ teef! Mouf of dem, ennyweys.”

      “Fucking Immie cunts!” Eldest began to regret not putting that bullet in the countess’s back, but it was far, far too late for second thoughts. Meanwhile the Imomain evacuation proceeded apace, leaving the Rangers little to do but watch both the soldiers and the sun depart together.

Chapter Text

      The drumming of many hooves filled the air, in an eerie reprise to the earlier approach of the Imomain cavalry. Not daring to hope this time Eldest looked downriver, half expecting another Imomain force, one that couldn't be bluffed this time. The rising thunder of the approaching hooves crested as horsewomen poured out of the same arroyo that the earlier Imomain force did, but this time they wore the blue of the Queen's Army, and Eldest recognized the banner of one of the two cavalry companies attached to the 22nd. When they'd begun the march there were troopers in those companies who had trouble staying on their horses, but after the weeks of the march and under the Colonel's stern eye they were shaping up as a credit to the Queen's Army.

      Unfortunately, they betrayed their inexperience a moment later as individual troopers opened fire with pistols and carbines at the retreating Imomains.

      “Idiots!” she cursed, dropping back into the redoubt as the inevitable return fire from Immie snipers came in reply. She hurriedly strung her discarded jacket on the cannon tool that had held her earlier truce flag, and raised it over the redoubt like a banner, bellowing;

      “Cover! Get to cover now!”

      Fusillades of gunfire broke out, the troopers firing across the river at the retreating Immomains, with the angry crackle of Imomain gunfire coming in reply. She heard the curses of the companies’ officers echoing her own warning, and a bellow that had to have come the Colonel herself. Suddenly a trooper screamed, pitching off her horse in a heap and it began to dawn on the unblooded troopers that this wasn’t a game. En masse they galloped the best cover available, either the lee of the redoubt or over the embankment. By some miracle they lost no more women while the better part of the company ended up sheltered behind their little fort. The Colonel herself rode up, dismounting her big roan and striding up to them. Seeing Eldest her normally impassive face broke into an oddly exasperated grin.

      “Great Hera’s teat, Sergeant,” she boomed. “I’ve heard of women with brass tits, but what are yours? Cast iron? Standing off an entire Imperial Army with a single troop… I don’t know whether I should be giving you a medal or committing you to a lunatic asylum!”

      Eldest grimaced. “You ought to bust me back down to private and drum me out of the regiment,” she admitted, shamefaced. “Apple as good as told me there was a ford we didn’t know about and I didn’t listen.”

      Wellsbury shook her head. “Hell, if I was to dock you on that I’d have to put myself in the dock right along with you. I was standing right there when she told us that wild tale and all I was thinking was that a girl who could lie with that straight a face deserved a reprieve, and half her pig to boot.”

      Eldest pursed her lips to inquire further when Apple herself rode up. Eldest raised her brows in surprise. She wasn’t mounted on Jasper, she was astride a magnificent, glossy black steed a full hand taller than Jasper, making her look even more absurd than usual, like a child riding a draft mare. Her hand on the reins was sure and steady, though; the horse was obviously exquisitely trained. Oddly, her sack-coat was buttoned up, she usually left it open as Eldest herself did.

      “Sergeant! You’re alive!” she cried happily. “I was all kinds of worried for y’all!”

      “It was a near thing, but we’re alive. All of us. And you! You did well, drummer girl. Fetched the Colonel right proper!”

      Apple’s face fell. “I lost Sarah. We was riding hard, ran right into those Immie women, had to split up, jus’ like you tol’ us to. I gots to go search for her!”

      “Don’t bother. She’s here with us. The Immies traded her back to us for passage across the river. She’s banged up, but she’ll live.”

      “You did *WHAT*?!!!” shrieked a new woman.

      Eldest looked over to find a civilian ranchwoman beside the Colonel, her handsome, aquiline features twisted in rage and terror. A woman, she realized with a shock, on the very ragged edge of her control.

      “You stupid bitch,” she bawled in Eldest’s face. “Don’t you know what you’ve done? Those Imomain crib-poxed whores *just stole my brothers*!!”

      Dumbfounded, Eldest stared across the swiftly flowing river as the last of the Imomain ‘tail’ retreated over the embankment, her brain recalling Rose’s earlier words as the Imomains had crossed. ‘Long braids on two of them’. Sweet mothers. “A *husband raid*? All this for a fucking *husband raid*?!!”

      The ranchwoman turned to the Colonel, face, voice desperate. “Colonel, we have to go after them! Get your women mounted up, we can still catch them…”

      The Colonel’s face was stone, and her tone even more so. “Miss Wheeler, I am sorry. But I have no authority to violate the border. I cannot start a war, not even over a theft of brothers.”

      “Start a war? It’s already started! They started it! They…”

      “Are on their side of the river now. Under no circumstances am I or any of my troopers permitted to cross that river.”

      The naked emotion on Eldie Wheeler’s face was painful to see, her face almost purpling. “Fine! I’ll do it myself!” Enraged, she swung up her horse, snatching her pistol from holster… only to be wrestled off by a covey of sisters and officers, kept from harming herself or others by the simple expediency of bear-hugging her until she stopped fighting and began to weep. It was deeply uncomfortable to watch; a woman should keep better control, and yet not one trooper or officer would blame her in the slightest. She’d just lost two brothers, after all.

Chapter Text

      After Eldie Wheeler was disarmed and hustled off by a flock of sisters, the Colonel turned to Eldest and her troop, debriefing them of everything that had happened since they’d rode out of the camp. In return, she filled them in on what they had missed. The sun had set, but a nearly full moon had risen, lighting the landscape in silver and greys. Around them, Captain Buford’s cavalry company manned their battered strong point and dug in at others, establishing sniper’s nests and overlapping fields of fire. Any attempt by the Imomains to re-cross now really would be suicide.

      “There’s really a causeway there?” Asked the Colonel, looking over the river, sparkling in the moonlight and rushing its way south.

      “Wide enough for four riders abreast, or one full-sized dray. I don’t know how they did it, but Apple was right, you can sort of see it, if you know where to look. See the little bulge, in the water just upstream of it? And another, smaller one a little downstream?”

      The Colonel looked where she pointed. The lines weren’t easy to see in the chaos of the rushing water, but if anything they stood out even better in the moonlight than during the day. “I do see them. It’s incredible. This must have taken years to construct, with the most fanatical security I’ve ever even heard of, especially from the Imomains. They have so many factions their spies have spies for their spies, and all of them are bribable by our people. Our usual problem is too *much* information from their side. But there wasn’t even a *whisper* of this!”

      “They must have wanted the boys really badly to go to this much trouble.”

      The Colonel scowled across the waters. “That’s absurd. What they want is the Blue Dagger, and the Daggerlands between. In the face of that, the boys are an afterthought, a distraction. I’m amazed they bothered. It makes no sense.” She gave a last gaze across the water and turned to Eldest. “Do you know that if hadn’t been for your warning, and your holding this point, those troopers would‘ve been reducing the last of our camp by this time tomorrow?”

      Eldest waved away the praise. “That’s an exaggeration. You could have held them.”

      “Four full strength Imperial Regiments with artillery and cavalry support? I admire your grit, but no.”

      “Where is the 22^nd?”

      “Still back at camp, hunkered down and throwing up additional emergency fortifications. Until I was sure of what we were facing I didn’t dare bring them out from behind walls. I sent your warnings on to General Falkirk at Santi-Judith and Colonel Shaw at Tradetown, and waited for a further report from you. But then we got a rider from the Wheeler Ranch, that they were under attack by Imomains. Under the circumstances I risked taking Joanna Buford’s company out for recon and reprisal. I’m glad I did. The Imomains were already gone by the time we’d got to the ranch, but we could follow them easily enough. We fought a few running skirmishes with their rear guard. The problem was, they knew where they were going, we didn’t, and their rear-guard kept pulling us farther and farther out of position. Until, that is,” she glanced over to where Apple hunkered down a short distance away, still clutching the reins of her mount. “Until Apple rode into us coming the other way, and told us where you were, what your disposition was, and the best way to get there. Then we could cut the chord on their circle, and their rear guard couldn’t do a damn thing about it.” She scowled bitterly. “Almost made it, too.”

      “If I had known you were coming…” she began earnestly.

      “There was no way you could have. Even if you had, it wouldn’t have made the slightest difference. You had, what, twenty rounds per gun at that point?”

      “Almost.”

      “You wouldn’t have lasted a single charge, then. You did the only thing you could have.”

      “I doubt Eldie Wheeler sees it that way.”

      “The hell with Eldie Wheeler, but you’re right. General Falkirk won’t be pleased either. Ah well,” she grunted. “It was a good career while it lasted.”

      “You can’t mean that, Ma’am! This wasn’t your fault…”

      “Fault has very little to do with it,” the Colonel told her gruffly. “It doesn’t matter that we –you- stopped an invasion. The only thing the papers will care about is that the Imomains rode off with two beautiful Queensland boys, and we didn’t stop it. I shudder at what the Herald will do with meat like that to chew and even the Loyalist papers like the Clarion won’t be able to play it down too much. Someone will be responsible, and that’s usually the CO in whose Area of Operations it occurred.”

      “Sounds like Brigadier Butler’s in a heap of trouble, then.”

      “Eh?” the Colonel glanced at her.

      “Our AO is two miles that way,” she pointed south. “We’re maybe eighteen miles from Santi-Judith. Brigadier Butler’s 14^th has responsibility for this section of the river. Speaking of which… we should have seen at least one patrol by now. It’s not like they could have missed a battle this size!”

      “Butler was counting on the river,” reflected the Colonel. “Not that I can criticize, I was doing the same.”

      “We at least had patrols.”

      “You’re sure this is her AO?”

      “I was just finishing up the maps you asked for. It’s not ours, that’s for sure.”

      A slow smile came to the Colonel’s lips. “Well, that’s a mercy. But if it’s not ours what was Apple doing so far north?”

      Eldest looked over to where Apple still huddled, knees tucked up in her arms, reins in one hand, looking oddly pensive. “That’s a fair question. Apple?” she called.

      Apple looked up. “Yes, Sergeant?”

      “What brought you all this way to begin with?”

      She shrugged. “Jus’ lookin’ fer firebush is all.”

      The Colonel chuckled. “And the firebush by camp wasn’t good enough for you?”

      Apple shook her head mournfully. “It’s a right peculiar thing, but every firebush near camp is done plucked bare like a Winterfair goose. I guess I’s not the only one who likes a little fire in her food. I gots to range far and wide to find any a’tall.”

      It was all Eldest could do not to burst out laughing. “Such a pity,” she murmured with all the sincerity she could muster. “But now that we’ve a moment… where’s Jasper?”

      “I’ve been meaning to ask her that myself,” snorted the Colonel.

      Apple sighed, still clasping her legs. “Jasper done threw a shoe what with all the hard ridin’ we was doin’. I couldn’t keep him at it over all this cobble, he’d split a hoof and go lame fer sure iffin I did.”

      “Oh Apple, you didn’t have to put him down, did you?”

      She looked up, surprised. “No! Naw, I jus’ turned him out. He’s probably back at camp by now, wheedling the stable hands for every extra oat he can and pretendin’ like I don’t feed him none. But that put me on shanks’mare so I had to rustle me up a new mount.”

      “I’ll say you did,” noted the Colonel, with a twinge of admiration in her voice. “Where on earth did that black beauty come from?”

      “Oh, I jus’ found him on the trail, bye an’ bye.”

      “You found him. A horse as fine as that. Tacked like that. Just wandering the trail?”

      “Well, there was this Imomain officer that was chasin’ me at the time,” she admitted reluctantly.

      “So an Imomain officer was chasing you… and you found a horse after Jasper threw the shoe?”

      “Not… exactly.”

      Eldest gritted her teeth. “Where, exactly, did the horse come from then?”

      Apple burrowed further into her knees, rocking back and forth a little. “I reckon the horse belonged to the officer, seein’ as how she was ridin’ him at the time that she was chasin’ me.”

      “So this Imomain officer… that was chasing you… decided to give you her horse out of the goodness of her heart?”

      “No,” she confessed softly. “I shot her first. Then I stole her horse. An’ then I left her to die.”

      “You shot her.”

      “No more’n I had to!” she protested.

      “You shot an Imperial officer,” Eldest repeated in disbelief. “Was she down for good?”

      “I don’t rightly know,” she said quietly. “But she weren’t lookin’ too healthy when I left.”

      “Apple, is this another one of your tall tales?”

      “No,” she curled tighter into her little ball. “I only wishted it was.”

      Eldest paused at Apple’s tone, forcing herself to remember how young she really was, and that she was far more devout than the average trooper. Eldest herself hadn’t been much older than Apple when she first took a life, but she’d been part of a patrol of recruits and four other girls had claimed the same bandit she had. It had been years later before she knew, unequivocally, that her bullet had ended another woman’s life. She’d become good at compartmentalizing that knowledge, but thinking on it brought back the memory of it, that sick guilty feeling, to the fore. She paused, contemplating the little knot of misery before her, unsure for once of what to say.

Chapter Text

      It was the Colonel that rescued her, as she stood to examine the horse, going over beast and gear. “Cordovan brand,” she noted. “Imperial stables. That’s… not a tall tale. This is quite a prize you have here, Apple.”

      “Do you want him?” she asked eagerly, offering the Colonel his reins.

      “Great Hera’s teat, girl, I can’t take him, he’s *your* prize, you won him fair and square.”

      “I don’t want him,” she declared. “He’s too big fer me… and while I cain’t find fault with his trainin’ or his lungs, he’s too plumb stupid fer a plainsgirl. If you don’t take him I’ll just be settin’ him loose to find his own way home… Cep’tin he’s an idiot and on the wrong side o’ the river,” she reflected. “He’ll jus’ wander ‘till his leg finds a gopher hole, belike.”

      The Colonel hesitated, clearly torn.

      “It’s only fair, you gave me a horse, now I kin give you one back.”

      “They’re not even remotely comparable. Apple, Jasper’s… fine, when he isn’t pitching riders into ditches. But he’s just a common cross, and not a well mannered one at that. This one… has breeding.”

      “I don’t care. He don’t suit me, and I don’t suit him. That ain’t gonna change. But, if you like, when I’s growed grey and retired and have a little farm with a lover or three, you can send me a colt an’ a likely filly or two of his get, and we’ll call it even.”

      The Colonel thought that over. “Well then. That’s a deal.”

      Apple stood and gratefully handed over the reins. “I reckon you’ll need a new name for him. I calls him Fat Ninny, on account of all that straw between his ears.”

      “Fat Ninny? Now is that entirely fair?”

      “It surely is. I shot his rider down and he just let me swing him up like I was goin’ for a Herasday stroll. If someone tried to do that to me and Jasper… Why, Jasper, he’d turn them into a leakin’ sack of broken bones and regrets, you jus’ see if he wouldn’t!”

      “Jasper would do all that anyway,” muttered Eldest, but let it pass. “What’s with your coat?”

      “My coat?”

      “It’s warm, but you’re buttoned up.”

      “Oh, I’s gots to requisition a new shirt is all.”

      “You found horse but lost a shirt?”

      “Pretty much. I had to use it as bandage.”

      “Apple!” she exclaimed, taking a quick step towards her. “You’re hurt?”

      “Naw, I’s fine,” she hastily stepped back and waved the concern away. “But Jasper done took a few scrapes.”

      Eldest relaxed with a chuckle. “You’re too sweet on that animal by half. You know how much trooper’s shirts cost the Queen’s purse?”

      “Two gil three quince,” she piped, a little more like her old self. “I do figures fer Major Kiverly, after all. But this one was headed fer rags anyway, I’d jus’ about outgrowed it. All this did was push things down the road a little faster.”

      The Colonel snorted. “I’d say the Queens can stand the charge. A shirt’s a small price to pay for the whole of the Daggerlands.”

      “True enough. It still doesn’t explain Miss Modest over here though. You finally starting to fry us up a set of eggs, girl?” she teased.

      Apple gave her a shy smile. “Maybe a little.”

Chapter Text

      Life at camp had settled into a routine in the weeks since that frantic night. General Falkirk herself had come down to debrief them, and engineers were sent to examine the causeway. The Imomains, for their part, seemed content in their camps, patrolling the river but otherwise making no new  offensive moves. The lull gave Eldest the time to finish her report on the incident, calling this or that trooper in to refresh her memories. By that time the engineers had finished their report and Eldest sat in on the resulting meeting while her women rested and recovered.

      “The whole thing is made of iron.” was the report from Captain Tanaka. “Made to lie flat on the riverbed, but it can be raised from either side by winching two hidden cables. Because it lies edge-on to the current it’s very difficult to spot even when it is raised; it doesn’t disturb the river flow much. The basic idea isn’t anything new, they’re known as smuggler’s fords out east, but I’ve never even heard of one this large and complex. The engineering is… truly impressive.” Tanaka concluded in frank admiration.

      “How the hell did they build it without us knowing?” growled the Colonel.

      “That was my thought as well,” came Falkirk’s soft voice.

      “I don’t think they were the builders. The castings are from the Darby ironworks in Coalbrook, and they went out of business fifty years ago. From that and other clues, I’d say it was built about seventy years ago, right around the end of the Two-Dagger war. It would have been easy enough to do back then, given the chaos of the time and the isolated location. I’d say this was some smuggling families’ meal ticket. With their ability to move bulk goods without tax or detection, they’d have owned the market. It probably became less valuable over time though, after the Imomains ended their embargo, we lowered our tariffs and regular trade became cheaper.”

      “Until the Immies found out about it and decided to put it to another use.”

      “I’d say the evidence strongly suggests it. We might want to see if any old border families with ties to smuggling have been arrested on the Imomain side in the last year.”

      “So… all this was just a crime of opportunity?” Eldest ventured.

      “Perhaps,” commented the Colonel, still clearly dissatisfied, but unable to offer a better explanation.

Chapter Text

      With so many meetings going on it was no surprise to be called to yet another one. Yet when she arrived it was apparent that this one would be different. To be summoned to a meeting with the Colonel and other senior officers was normal. Entering the command tent to find two Imomain officers in immaculate starched uniforms was not. Her fingers itched to drop to the butt of her pistol, but both wore a white kerchief threaded through the right epaulette of their uniforms, so these were obviously emissaries. Both were handsome women; dusky skin, glossy black hair and aquiline features. That, combined with the polish of their uniforms made Eldest feel every inch the common line-soldier's daughter that she was. Nor was that the only surprise; at the opposite end of the table were Mother Elder Wheeler and two of her daughters, all with sour faces set in stone. Looking at them, Eldest was reminded of General Falkirk's warning regarding the border folk; the two sets of women looked almost like sisters. Setting her jaw, she did her best to ignore the Immomain women while coming to attention and saluting her own officers; General Falkirk of course, then Colonel Wellsbury as well.

      "Sergeant Eldest, Queen's Rangers, reporting as ordered, Ma'am." she said crisply.

      "Thank you, Sergeant," came General Falkirk's surprisingly soft voice. "I believe you know the officers present, and Mother Elder Wheeler and her oldest daughters, Eldie and Constance. Our visitors are Colonel the Duchess Emilita Sidonia and Captain Carolina Gonsalav, emissaries," her voice grew noticeably cooler, "from the Princess Esperanza Nina Martes Olivares y Sidonia de Santi-Imomani, commanding the Imomain Imperial forces arrayed opposite us. Duchess Sidonia, Captain Gonsalav, this is the woman you asked after. May we proceed with your embassy?"

      "Ah," commented the elder of the two Imomanian women, studying her. "The Devil of the Ford. You cost us more than a few good women, Sergeant."

      "None of which would have been necessary if you'd stayed on your own side of the river," returned Eldest evenly.

      "Alas, we might say the same of you. Our ancestresses clearly intended the Brown Dagger river when the treaty defining the bounds of our countries was drawn, not the Blue Dagger. You occupy Imomain soil."

      At a warning glance from the Colonel, Eldest swallowed a few tart replies to that and fixed her gaze at nowhere in particular. "We respectfully disagree."

      The woman nodded. "It seems we must. My embassy does not concern the older quarrel.  My mistress, the Princess Esperanza de Santi-Immomania, wishes me to convey her respect and admiration to you and your fighting women, for your courage and tenacity. Though our nations have oft been rivals, there is no question of you Queenslanders' courage." She turned then to the stony-faced Wheelers. "She also bid me pay respect to the wisdom of yourself and your sisters in yielding brothers you could not hope to save. The minimum of bloodshed on both sides is a testament to that good sense."

      "Sanctimonious bitch!" snarled Eldie Wheeler, despite a warning hand from her Mother Elder. "Thieving Imomain whore! We would have fought to the last sister rather than let you touch them! *They* slipped out the back window, rather than let us protect them as sisters should!"

      Surprisingly, the Imomain duchess shrugged off the vitriol. "You seem to think you're being mocked," she said quietly. "I assure you this is not so. It is always bitter to lose a husband, father, brother or son to the needs of other women. We Sidonias, and even more so, the Gonsalavs," she nodded to her younger companion, "we know this well. For example, I had a nephew once, the most beautiful boy you could imagine, named Alain; Carolina's uncle. He was just fourteen and due to be married though I don't think his sister's choice of wives pleased him. He disappeared from his room, just a few nights before the wedding, never to be seen again."

      Eldest noticed the younger Wheeler still scowled, but her Mother Elder had gone rather quiet and still.

      "I hadn't been born yet when it occurred, but my mothers spoke often of their bitterness over their brother's loss," spoke the younger Imomain envoy. "As the grandson of the Royal Prince Carlos, he was a prize. The loss of his brother's price set our family back a generation at least. But what was worse, at least to my younger mothers, was not knowing the fate of their beloved older brother. Was he happy in the arms of a loving family? Dead in some nameless grave? Used and discarded by some plump-fingered crib governess? The not knowing, they said, was the worst." She leaned forward across the table. "Perhaps you could tell them... cousins," she said pointedly to the younger Wheelers.

      Eldie Wheeler just looked confused but her mother let out a long sigh. "How did you find out?" she asked.

      It was the duchess that answered. "You sent a daughter to the trade show and fiesta in Cordova last year. There's a tendency to birthmarks on the right arm in the Sidonia line and since my brother married into the Gonsalavs, one finds it in them as well... Angel kisses, we call them. My sister Sophia was quite perplexed to see something similar in a Queensland devil Wheeler. It didn't take much investigating to notice you Wheelers married a new husband of uncertain ancestry within a month of Alain's disappearance. Though how you managed it, snatching him from the heart of a guarded hacienda..." her voice trailed off in frank admiration.

      "It wasn't that hard," scoffed Mother Eldest Wheeler. "He stole himself away. He was indeed not pleased, as you put it, with his sister’s choice of wives. Bloated toads, he called them, the youngest two decades older than he."

      The younger envoy, Carolina, winced. "Some of my earliest memories are of my mothers arguing, often and loudly, over our Madre Familia's choice of the Navarras as wives for their brother. Financially it would have been a good choice, politically an even better one... would have been, if the marriage had been concluded. But as for the rest... well, yes."

      "I believe his flight also had something to do with the Navarras' previous husbands dying in odd accidents when they failed to sire boys," Mother Wheeler went on icily. "One fell down a flight of stairs, the other shot himself while cleaning a gun... as if any woman would permit her husband a gun."

      Carolina startled. "I hadn't heard that."

      "My sister Bella found him on the river, trying to make a raft, so of course she took him."

      "Of course," echoed the Duchess.

      "All that, however, is ancient history," Mother Elder Wheeler grated. "What I want to know is *what have you done with my sons*?"

      "They are alive and well, under the personal protection of Her Highness, my mistress the Princess Esperanza," replied the Duchess promptly. "Indeed, they have scarce left her side these past few weeks. She credits their nursing with her remarkable recovery from her wound."

      "Wound?" asked the Colonel sharply.

      "Yes. Did you not know? Our princess took a bullet in the course of her adventures."

      "Hope it was mine," muttered Eldie Wheeler.

      "Alas, that honor belongs to another," replied the Duchess, unflappable. "In any case, the Princess is determined to keep what she has shed royal blood to have. Besides, she's fallen quite in love with your boys. "

      "Love," echoed Mother Elder Wheeler in disbelieving deadpan.

      "Is it so surprising? They have the beauty of their father and they are the great grandsons of a Royal Prince. Their blood is that of the noble families of Gonsalav, Sidonia and Santi-Imomani itself. Our Princess is willing to overlook a little Queensland devil blood in the mix, especially as shy and modest as you've raised them. She is quite taken with them, and she is not the only one. If it weren't for the fact they belong to the Princess, half the army would be plotting to steal them away."

      "If they weren't my cousins, I'd be plotting to steal them away myself," murmured Carolina.

      Mother Elder Wheeler's face started to darken, but the Duchess raised a hand to forestall the outburst. "Lovely as they are, your boys are proving unbiddable on a single point; they insist they will be no families' husbands until their brother's prices are paid."

      "Brother's prices," echoed Eldie Wheeler in disbelief.

      The Duchess shrugged. "It does seem a bit odd to stage a husband raid and then pay the price, and yet Carolina tells me it is not so unusual, here on the Border."

      "A great many things are not so unusual here on the Border," murmured Carolina. "Finding you have an entire family of cousins you never knew about not least among them."

      All three Wheelers looked entirely nonplussed, but it was Eldie who recovered first. "A brother's price your Princess will no doubt set to her liking," she scoffed. "Tell me, how much does she value my brothers?"

      "More than you might expect," replied the Duchess quietly. "They are, after all, of noble blood. To offer a low price would be to besmirch that blood and insult the families involved. She does not want her husbands to despise her, either. Fifteen hundred escudos, was her word on the matter."

      Eldie startled, and Eldest along with her. The Imomain Escudo was a larger coin than the Queensland Crown, roughly twice its worth. The standard going rate of a brother's price was about a thousand crowns, and the princess was offering three times that. "Fifteen hundred escudos." repeated Mother Elder Wheeler in wonder.

      "Fifteen hundred. Each," said the duchess.

      If the first offer had startled the Wheelers, the second fairly floored them. "Three thousand escudos, six thousand crowns," repeated Eldie in disbelief and shock,

      "Even so," nodded the duchess. "Of course," she went on silkily, "if you are entitled to a brother's price, surely my kinswomen the Gonsalavs are entitled to the same?"

      The Wheeler's expressions went from wondering to cynical in a heartbeat.

      “I knew there had to be another shoe in there somewhere,” muttered Eldie, while her mother just grimaced.

      “And just how high a brother’s price do the Gonsalavs set on their brother, my husband?” she asked resignedly.

      The duchess looked to her companion, “An interesting question. What was it, Carolina, all those years ago?”

      Carolina smiled. “Coincidentally enough, it was fifteen hundred escudos,” she replied promptly. “I can hardly forget the figure, it was yelled often enough as my mothers argued.”

      Eldie’s lip curled up in a snarl, but her mother laid yet another restraining hand on her arm.

      “Look at it this way,” the duchess went on earnestly. “You and your sisters have had twenty years of his comfort, interest free. His Imperial bloodline puts a premium on his sons you would otherwise not be seeing, and not just the twins; you will have prominent Imomain families lining up to court your little Leon, when he comes of age. To say nothing of any additional sons he might throw between then and now.”

      That hit them hard. Clearly they were discomfited to the duchesses’ knowledge of their third son, but then it was common knowledge the Wheelers had another boy, it was spoken in envious whispers often enough. Finally Mother Elder Wheeler nodded in defeat.

      "We will have visiting privileges to my sons, so that we may be sure they are treated well and are content," she stated firmly.

      "Of course", agreed the duchess. "Provided that the same courtesy is given to my kinswomen, the Gonsalavs, to their brother and uncle Alain."

      Again, the Wheelers were discomfited. Allow foreign women access to their husband and father? Preposterous! And yet... it was no more than they were asking for their own sons. Constance looked at her mother. "Mama Elder, is Papa really...?"

      "Alain Carlos Sidonia y Gonsalav?" her mother answered. "Yes. He took the Queensland name Daniel because he wanted to make sure there would be no bloodfeud with his family... Whom he still loves," she said sharply to Carolina, "despite their intent to sell him to cruel and abusive women."

      Carolina winced and said nothing, clearly not inclined to dispute the point.

      "I guess if we have a right, they have a right," Eldie admitted sullenly.

      Her Mother Elder nodded. "Very well," she said. "No more than three to start with, and they will not retain their weapons indoors."  

      The duchess nodded in her turn. "This is reasonable. The princess will not insist on a like limit on numbers, but you must understand private weapons have always been forbidden in the palace. It is no different with your own Queens."

      Mother Elder Wheeler pursed her lips, thinking. "Imomain custom is that boys wed at fourteen. Modern Queensland custom is sixteen. Your princess will follow the Queensland custom."

      "Granted," replied the duchess. "A royal wedding could hardly be arranged in, hmmm, six weeks is it? Anyway."

      Eldest Wheeler thought further. "We will have all this laid out in contracts," she said firmly. "As a proper marriage. Even though your princess's courting was a little...aggressive."

      "Of course," said the duchess innocently, as if to suggest otherwise was unthinkable, as if her princess had not just led a small army to abduct her new husbands from their home.

      From where she listened, Eldest had to stifle a laugh. It was clear why the princess had chosen this canny woman as her envoy.

      Mother Elder Wheeler turned to her daughters. "That's all I can think off, offhand. Is there anything I've overlooked?

      Eldie and Constance shook their heads. "Anything we've missed, the law-clerks will find," Eldie commented.

       Mother Elder Wheeler nodded. "Then let's get to them. With your permission, General?" she asked, rising.

      The duchess rose with them. "Before you go, Mother Wheeler, I have one last thing for you," she said, offering a rolled sheet of parchment, tied with gold ribbon. Both Eldie and her mother looked at it with suspicion, but Mother Elder Wheeler took and unrolled it. "It's a... receipt?" she asked, confused.

      "Of a sort," nodded the Duchess. "It confirms that the Wheeler family name has been entered into the Libro de Oro in the Great Cathedral in Cordova, and due the dignity and honors of the Hildalga."

      All three Wheelers startled, and Eldest along with them. The Imomains guarded their noble bloodlines with a fanaticism that made the Queens look like pikers in contrast.  Their Mother Elder recovered first, trying to hand the parchment back. "We... we are loyal Queenswomen. I cannot accept this," she said, but the duchess deftly turned the sheet away.

      "Oh, it isn't something one accepts or rejects," the duchess told them silkily. "It's just simple acknowledgement of your families' status on Imomain soil. You can hardly visit your sons as commoners, after all, commoners are not permitted even in the Plaza de Triunfo, let alone the palace grounds.”

      “The hildalga are landowners!” protested Mother Elder Wheeler. “We own no Imomain land!”

      “Oh, I must disagree,” smiled the duchess. “The fact that the Wheeler farm is currently under Queensland rule does not change its essential character as Imomain soil.”

      Mother Elder Wheeler gave Falkirk a slightly panicked look, perhaps foreseeing her family ground between two stones, Imomain and Queensland. But Falkirk merely shook her head patiently.

      “Really, duchess. I thought we had agreed to disagree over the Two Daggers. Surely one war was enough?”

      “We did; I do beg your pardon,” conceded the Duchess. “One war was indeed enough. For now.”

      Still clutching the parchment, Mother Wheeler looked from one woman to the other, but as it became clear the fireworks were over she turned again to Falkirk. “If there’s nothing further, general?” she asked.

      Falkirk nodded and, with the details agreed to, the Wheelers left to arrange the fine print.

Chapter Text

      After watching the Wheelers go, the Duchess then turned to Eldest. "Now that that's out of the way, I have but one last charge from my princess. She wishes to return this to its owner with her thanks, but has no idea whom to direct it to. Perhaps you can assist me in this?" She handed Eldest a small package, wrapped in common brown paper. "I assure you it has been washed, but alas, blood is one of the most difficult things to remove."

      "Blood?" asked Eldest, unwrapping the package, "A Queenslander gave her this?"

      "Even so," the duchess nodded. "The little devil, she calls her, or sometimes her little angel. Sometimes she uses the one, and sometimes the other. I'm not sure I understand it myself."

      The paper fell away, and a simple white muslin shirt fell into Eldest's hands. The pattern was a common-issue trooper's shirt. Eldest herself wore the same shirt writ larger. This one, however, was blotched with brown stains, the color of dried and washed blood... and not from a small wound. Eldest didn't even need to look at the stitching where the sleeves had been taken in to know whose it was. Even if she hadn't already known Apple was missing a shirt, there was only one trooper in the whole regiment this one would fit.

      Eldest shot a quick glance to General Falkirk. At a nod from the General, she cleared her throat. "Ah, yes, I rather think we could find the owner of this particular shirt," she deadpanned, then glanced again to the General. "I would imagine we want a private word with her first, though?"

      General Falkirk nodded slowly, intrigued. "Oh yes, I think we would."

      "Of course," nodded the duchess, rising.

      The envoys were excused while Apple was summoned. She arrived curious and slightly apprehensive, with a 'what-did-I-do-now?' sort of look.

      Eldest showed her the shirt, stained with blood as it was and she went quite still, looking down at her feet.

      “Would you happen to recognize this, Apple?” she asked.

      “I reckon so,” she said quietly, still looking at her feet. “It’s mine.”

      “You told me you’d used it as a bandage.”

      “Well, I did.”

      “You told me you used it as a bandage for your horse.”

      “Beggin’ your pardon, Sergeant, I said Jasper done took a few scrapes, I didn’t say nothin’ about bandagin’ ‘em.”

      “Apple…” grated Eldest in frustration.

      “Tell us what happened, Apple,” ordered the Colonel.

      Apple took a deep breath then set her jaw and looked up. “It all happened like I said in the report, ma’am. Sarah and me, Sergeant sent us as couriers back to camp, tol’ us to stay together unless we git intercepted, then split up.  We rode hell-fer-leather, and ended up ridin’ almost into a whole company of Imomain cavalry. Only thing that saved us was that they were as plumb surprised as we were. I reckon they figgered out our mission right quick though, and they gave chase. Our horses was already tired and they’s was fresh, and Sarah, she started laggin’ behind. She yelled at me to keep on.” Apple threw Eldest an anguished look. “I didn’t want to leave her none, but you ordered, she ordered, and that was m’duty.”

      “That was the right thing to do,” the Colonel told her firmly. “Then what happened?”

      Apple took a deep breath to center herself, then went on. “Well, Jasper’s the fastest thing on four hooves this side of the Mother River, and me, I don’t slow him down much, so we pulled ahead of most all of ‘em but one, this Imomain officer on that Fat Ninny what I gave to the Colonel. It wasn’t Jasper’s fault- he’d already run a fair piece even before they started chasin’ us. That officer, she started takin’ pistol shots at us, and winged a hot one past my ear. I didn’t much like gettin’ shot at without shootin’ back so I kinda twisted in the saddle and squeezed off a round at her. That missed, but I forgot I’d never trained Jasper to abide havin’ a shooter aboard, and he started gettin’ fussy. That’s when he threw a shoe. I had to pull him up easy then, I would have lamed him if’n I’d kept on,” she fretted.  “I couldn't do that to Jasper, throw away his life like that.” Another deep breath, and she continued.

      “I knew the Imomain officer weren’t far behind, so I kinda tumbled off Jasper behind a boulder with my Fillybranch ready. That Imomain woman, she rode right up with her pistol and said somethin’ like “Surrender, you damned little Queensgirl devil’, an… an that’s when I raised my rifle an… an I shot her.” Apple swallowed, distressed. “She was real surprised and toppled off her horse. I reckon what happened was she mistook my shortened Fillybranch six-shooter for one of those old single-shot cavalry musketoons. They’s about the same size and length. Since I’d already fired, she prob’ly reckoned I was empty.” Apple wrung her hands in distress. “Well, I knew I had to keep on, and the only sound horse there was hers. So I wrangled him over, but lookin’ at her, I just couldn’t leave her like that. I took off m’shirt, plugged her where she bled and set her up easy-like, so she wouldn’t drown in her own blood. It didn’t take more’n a few moments, honest. Then I swung up her horse and pressed on. I met up with the Colonel and Fawn awhiles after.” She nodded to Wellsbury, “and guided ‘em back to the river.”

      “Why didn’t you tell me this when I was writing the report?” Eldest growled, furious.

      Apple fidgeted, trying to avoid her gaze. “It wasn’t important, really,” she swallowed at Eldest’s look and hurriedly put in, “An’… an’ I thought you’d be proper mad at me for wastin’ time givin’ aid and comfort to the enemy.”

      “I *am* proper mad at you, but not for giving aid and comfort.”

      Apple looked down at her feet, ashamed. “Yes, Sergeant,” she whispered.

      General Falkirk cleared her throat. “Why did you take the time to help that officer?”

      Apple looked up again. “My mamma, she tol’ me it was wrong for me… for me to kill. An’ she looked so hurt an’ helpless, I couldn’t just leave her to die. That’s all.” She straightened. “I ain’t sorry I shot her. Well, not much. Sergeant and the troop was countin’ on me. But I cain’t… I ain’t sorry I helped her neither.”

      Falkirk grunted. “Filial piety. Will wonders never cease. Do you always do what your mother tells you?”

      Tears came and stood in Apple's eyes. “I ain’t never disobeyed my mamma but once. An’ that once were enough,” she said softly. After a moment she looked up at the officers.   “Am… am I being drummed out of the Regiment?” she asked, forlorn.

      Falkirk gave a wry sort of smile. “Actually, drummer girls are not expected to bear arms or shoot enemies. You can hardly be disciplined for succoring an enemy that, properly speaking, you weren’t supposed to have shot in the first place.”

      “Truly?” Apple asked hopefully.

      “Truly. But do you have any idea who it was that you shot?”

      Apple gave a shake of her golden head. “No, Gen'ral. She were an officer, I’m sure of that, with all the fancy trimmin’s on her uniform. An’ her horse was plumb well-appointed, with silver tack instead of brass.  I figgered maybe she was a colonel?" she asked.

      "She was the Imomain princess in command of this whole pony-show, Princess Esperanza de Imomani."

      "Oh," said Apple in a soft and wide-eyed sort of way. "Jus’... jus’ how deep a hole am I in, Gen'ral?"

      "That remains to be seen. The princess has sent envoys, and they want to talk to you. I have decided to allow this. Be polite, listen to what they say, say as little as possible in return. If you're uncertain about what to say, defer to a superior officer. Queen's Rangers gather information; they don't hand it out. Can you do that?"

      Apple swallowed and nodded somberly. "Yes, gen'ral, ma'am... but... the woman I shot is alive?" she asked, voice trembling.

      Falkirk nodded. "She is. It's her envoys that want to talk to you."

      Apple brushed a tear from one eye and gave them all a beautiful smile. “That’s… That’s the best news I ever got. I’ll stand ready to talk to ‘em, you’ll see.”

      “I never doubted it,” Falkirk told her with the faintest touch of a smile.

      After a little more coaching on what to say and how to say it, the envoys were called back. As they entered, one of the door flaps fell slightly ajar, allowing a stream of sunlight into the tent, setting Apple's hair shining like spun gold as she stood waiting by the command table.

      The duchess looked around, her eyes adjusting to the dimness of the tent before falling on Apple and her mouth formed a small 'o'. "Oh. Oh my. I believe I now understand the "little angel" part of my princess's tale," she murmured before turning to Eldest. "Is this what sore straits you Queenslanders are driven, that you have to send your babies out to fight us?"

      "Duchess Sidonia, this is Apple Drover," growled Eldest, introducing them. "Apple is a drummer-girl with the 22nd," she continued. "Considering what you owe her, shall we stick with military courtesies?”

      "Touché," the duchess conceded. Taking the folded shirt in hand, she went to one knee before Apple, putting them at eye level. Offering the shirt, she continued; "Apple Drover, my Imperial Mistress bids me return this to you with her thanks. Her physicians assure her it was a near thing as it was. Without the care you took for her, she surely would have died. An Imperial princess owes you her life; that is not a small thing."

      Apple accepted the shirt, holding it tight to her chest. "I’d… I’d feel better about that if I weren’t the one who shot her in the first place. Kin you tell her I's really sorry I had to go an' shoot her like that?" she asked the duchess earnestly.

      "Our princess is a soldier," the duchess replied with a smile. "She understands, but I will be sure to tell her that."

      Apple nodded earnestly again before scowling. "Jus’ make sure you tell her I's sorry but not too sorry on account of how her soldiers were real mean to Sarah when she surrendered!"

      The duchess blinked, taken aback by the vehemence in Apple's tone. "Ah... and now I think I see the little devil, too," she noted before continuing, with great formally, to Apple. “The princess… regrets how your trooper was treated. The soldiers involved have been reprimanded and their officers disciplined. The soldiers were- very angry that the princess they were sworn to protect was wounded so grievously, but that is not an excuse.” She turned to Falkirk and the other officers.

      “General, if you would care to set a suffering price on your trooper, my princess has bid me pay any reasonable amount without quibble.”

      "Ah," Falkirk's brows rose in surprise. "That is... an honorable offer. We will set such a price."

      The duchess inclined her head before continuing to Apple, “my princess has also bid me ask about the fate of her horse.”

      “Fat Ninny? He’s jus’ fine, though I’ve seen fully growed plains buffalo what ate less.”

      The duchess almost choked, trying to control her laughter, roughly covering it by clearing her throat. “Fat Ninny. What a name for the great Don Juan, one of the princes of the Imperial stables.”

      “Oh, is that his name? Beggin’ yer pardon ma’am, I was jus’ callin’ him like I was seein’ him at the time.”

      “No, no, my princess has much the same opinion, but, after all, males are not sought after for their brains.”

      Apple scowled at that. “Does she want him back? I’d gladly oblige, but I already done gave him to the Colonel, there,” she nodded to Wellsbury.

      “You… gave away… an Imperial mount?” the duchess asked in disbelief, her expression stunned.

      “I… reckoned seventeen hands might be a bit too much horseflesh, even fer a plainsgirl like me,” Apple told her tactfully.

      The duchess considered, glancing over to the tall Colonel and the diminutive Apple, giving a rueful shake of her head. “Well, you weren’t wrong.”

      “But the Colonel’s gonna send me a filly or two of his get, so it’s all the same in the end,” Apple assured her cheerfully.

      “I suppose so,” The duchess stood, contemplating Apple’s innocent gaze and rubbing her chin in amusement.

      The Colonel cleared her throat. “Does the Princess wish to ransom her horse back?”

      “No, no,” the duchess smiled. “Having just snatched herself two stallions she can hardly object to losing one. She merely wished to offer more than thanks to the girl who took the time to save her life. I daresay those fillies you owe her will be all the more valuable for this,” she concluded, handing the Colonel a rolled sheet of parchment, not unlike the one she’d passed earlier to the Wheelers.

      “This is?” asked the Colonel warily.

      “His pedigree.”

      The Colonel almost dropped the parchment, and Eldest drew in her breath. Only Apple seemed unaware of the significance of that sheet. The Imomains guarded their equine bloodlines with a fanaticism that was scarcely less than that which they guarded their noble ones.

      “That… That is a royal gift,” gasped the Colonel, when she recovered from her shock.

      “An Imperial one, certainly,” agreed the Duchess. “My princess has long thought that the isolation our people impose on ourselves has ceased to be productive -if it ever was- and that to grow we must reach outwards.”

      “She’s certainly done that with the Wheeler twins,” muttered Falkirk.

      “Even so, but she will cherish and take good care of them, of that you can be sure.”

      Falkirk steepled her hands. “I suppose that’s all any family can ask, when they give a son or brother into the ownership of his new wives.”

      “Imomain or Queensland, men are born to serve the needs of their women.”

      “True enough. Duchess, we’ve much to still to discuss but you have also given us much to think about. Shall we adjorn for today, and meet again in the morning?”

      “Of course, general.”

Chapter Text

      After the envoys had left, General Falkirk’s attention fell on Eldest and Apple. At her significant look Eldest dismissed Apple, leaving her alone with the two officers.

     Falkirk contemplated Eldest a few moments before speaking. “Sergeant, the Queens, and I, owe your entire troop a great debt,” she began, trailing off as she pursed her lips, searching, it seemed, for the right words.

      “But you’re getting the strappy end of the bone, nonetheless,” finished the Colonel bluntly. “All of the work and none of the glory.”

      Falkirk frowned at the crude image but then sighed. “I’d wanted a gentler phrasing, but yes. It’s just very, very difficult to present this a victory, even though that’s what it is.” She offered Eldest a copy of The Crossing, a local paper based in Santi Judith.

      Eldest quickly scanned the headline and story. In breathless prose it distilled down to ‘Beautiful virgin Queensland boys abducted by evil Imomain princess, forced to lead a life of sexual slavery to her vile, base lusts. Army helpless, princess even now *doing things* to our poor innocent boys, corrupting them with forbidden Imomain crib drugs to service her every need. Both of them. Together. Every night. With her perverted sisters waiting in the wings.’ Eldest winced, not sure which hurt more, the mental image or the purple prose.

      “And that’s just a teaser of what the Mayfair rags will make of it,” commented the general, seeing Eldest’s wince. “I’ve put you and your women in for the medal of valor but the truth is it’s wasted paperwork… It will be lost or misfiled, then quietly dropped to hide the embarrassment.”

      Ah, politics. Second only to disease as the worst enemy of a soldier. Despite the Imomain princess’s best efforts to soften the blow, the loss of the boys was a humiliation, a blow to Queensland’s pride, and technically it was Eldest who had allowed them get away with it. Nothing to do but put the best face on it she could. “That’s no matter. We were loyal Queenswomen before this mess and we’re loyal Queenswomen now. Medals will not change that.”

      “Well said. However, I can award the Star of Merit on my bare word, and that I will do, to you and all your women, with the exception of your drummer girl. Much as she deserves one, officially she can’t receive honors until she’s sixteen.”

      “We have something different in mind for her,” commented the Colonel with a slight smile.

      “You do? Ah… how much trouble is she in, really?" Eldest asked.

      Falkirk waved away her concern. "You needn’t worry. The best solution, of course, would have been to keep the Immies on their side of the river. But failing that, this is about the best result that could be hoped for. If the princess had been killed on our side of the river, even leading an invasion as she was, it would have meant war. A war as bad as the Two-Dagger war if not worse. Who knows how many women would have died before a reasonable peace could be obtained? As it is, their invasion has been stymied and their army given a bloody nose. We are almost untouched. Their princess has paid a heavy price, both in coin and in her own wounds, for what little she did obtain. That's a happy ending, in my book." She shrugged. "If I had been there, knowing what we know now, I would have ordered Apple to do exactly what she did."

      Eldest sighed in relief, but Wellsbury frowned and General Falkirk caught the change. "Colonel Wellsbury, you have a difference of opinion?"

      Wellsbury looked over to the general. "Not in any material aspect, ma’am. But, we have consistently been successful in past wars against the Imomains because their commanders are appointed for political reasons, not military competence. As a result, they are reckless, lack knowledge of logistics and the operational arts and are neither liked nor trusted by their common troopers, who are usually just drafted Peonas. Add to that the political fragmentation of their capital and they spend more time fighting each other than they do us."

      Falkirk nodded. "True enough."

      "Now, though, they have a princess who values the operational arts. Rather than vying for commands she wasn't suited for, she spent time apprenticing with real warriors until she was. She got four separate Imperial Regiments here, on time, well-equipped and ready to fight. Her plan should have worked. If it weren't for the fact this spring was unusually wet it almost certainly would have worked. They would have crossed the river with the full moon, long before Apple found their smuggler's ford. The 22nd, isolated, could have been overrun, then they could have turned north to Santi-Judith or south to Tradetown, and destroyed our forces piecemeal. They would have been sitting on the Brown Dagger long before the Queens could have gotten any additional forces here. And even though the weather wasn't in her favor and her larger plan fell through, this Princess Esperanza *still* succeeded. She stole two beautiful Queensland boys right from under our noses, symbolically avenging their failures in the Two-Dagger war. Think about it; she'll literally be screwing Queensland every time she goes to bed. Her people are going to know that. She's going to be hugely popular back home. She has two powerful noble houses solidly behind her in the Sidonias and the Gonsalavs. After she marries the Wheeler twins, she'll have blood ties to them as well.

      “Normally these princesses have to wait years before their grandmothers deign to grant them husband rights. If I recall, though, there's an exception for war plunder, as long as the groom, or grooms, are of noble blood. The Wheeler twins are the great-grandsons of an Imperial prince; her mothers and grandmothers can't deny those boy's noble blood without denying their own. Now what are all her sisters going to think? They can bow and scrape until they're thirty waiting for their grandmothers to recognize them and maybe assign them some toad of a male, or they can acknowledge Esperanza as senior wife and join her marriage. A marriage to not one, but two stunningly beautiful boys." Wellsbury shook her head ruefully. "If she plays her cards right, she'll be Empress in a few years."

      Falkirk nodded slowly, the import of it all hitting home. "I started out thinking this whole thing made no sense. Now it does. And the more I think about it, the less I like her little overture to the Wheelers. On Queensland soil, the Wheelers are wealthy, influential, prosperous commoners, but they are commoners. On Imomain soil, however, they're Hidalga, nobility. Minor nobility, to be sure, but one with a blood tie to the woman who just might be the next Empress."

      Wellsbury nodded in her turn. "The only real mistake the princess made was in going after Apple personally. That was her one bit of recklessness. She's just been taught a powerful lesson on the dangers of that. If she's smart enough to learn that lesson…" She grimaced. "I agree that short term, this was all for the best. Long-term, though, I just hope we don't end up wishing Apple had finished emptying that rifle into her and damn the consequences."

Chapter Text

      They picked up their Stars of Merit at a simple ceremony at evening flags. Eldest’s joined a small constellation of sisters on her uniform, but others like Sarah, May and Fawn picked up their first honors and beamed with pride as they did so. The real surprise came at the end, when Apple was called up to the podium. The troop stood stiffly at attention in two ranks, drawn up by patrol. The contrast between the tall Colonel and little Apple was almost comical but the Colonel addressed her as gravely as she would an adult.

      “Apple Drover, your age precludes me from awarding you the honors you deserve. However, despite your tender years you’ve done a woman’s job. Troopers,” she boomed before the assembled companies, “what is the reward in the Iron Regiment for a job well-done?”

      “Another job!” the companies roared back.

      “Just so. Apple Drover, drummer-girl first class, step forward!”

      Bewildered, Apple did so, and solemnly the Colonel produced two additional uniform stripes, which she held up for all the troopers to see.

      A roar of approval rolled in from the assembled companies, and the Colonel turned to Eldest.

      “Sergeant? If you would do the honors?”

      Astonished, Eldest nonetheless took the stripes and pinned them above the lone stripe that adorned Apple’s sleeve.

      “Sergeant of Drummer-Girls Drover, backward, step!”

      Apple stepped back, curt and military, but tears filled her eyes as she saluted the Colonel and the Colonel gravely returned the honor.

      “Colonel, ma’am, I’s… *I’m* honored but… what does a Sergeant of Drummer-Girls *do*?”

      “She supervises and trains the other drummer-girls, of course.”

      “But- I’m the only drummer-girl in the 22nd.”

      “That’s been true. I have long opposed the recruitment of drummer girls, figuring they couldn’t carry their weight. Recent events, however,” she observed dryly, “have convinced me that even the smallest of hands can carry the largest of burdens. Each Company is now given leave to recruit one, and only one, drummer girl, subject to the approval of their Captain.”

      “Drummer girls, forward!” the Colonel called, and three small forms detached themselves from the ranks and marched forward, shy and uncertain in their new uniforms.

      “Sergeant Drover, meet your new detail, Drummer-Girls Midge, Scrap and Stray. Needless to say you’re to school them in the traditions and discipline of the 22nd, to shape them into a credit to the regiment and the Queen’s Army.”

      Apple’s eyes were shining as she saluted. “Ay-yup! I’ll train ‘em up right well, you’ll see!”

      “I don’t doubt it. Train them well… And keep them out of mischief. I understand drummer-girls are very prone to mischief. Dismissed!”

Chapter Text

      Only a few days after the ceremony the first of the Imomain regiments departed, starting to draw down the forces they'd gathered so quickly. General Falkirk was taking a "you first" approach but through discussions with the envoys the understanding was clear; the extra troops would leave the border area, leaving each side with about the numbers they'd started with and a return to normalcy and reopening trade. That meant the Queensland regiments still on the way would be turned around and the 22nd would depart when the last non-border Imomain regiment did. The preparations involved meant that was still a number of weeks, but it was soon enough that Eldest found herself part of the honor guard escorting the Imomain envoys down to the ferry at Tradetown.

      Eldest found herself of two minds about the duty. On the one hand, what had happened to Sarah after her surrender was inexcusable, and Eldest harbored more than a little hate for the side that did it. On the other hand though, neither envoy had been a part of that and both were personable, vivacious women, good company. If it weren't for the quarrels of nations, they might well be friends. Perhaps similar thoughts occupied the duchess, for when they reached the ferry she turned to Eldest.

      "I suppose this is farewell, Sergeant. It's unlikely we'll meet again, but should you ever find yourself in Cordova, be sure to stop by Sidonia House. I'd be honored to have you as a guest and show you around our fair city."

      "That's… Unlikely, it's true," she replied. "Yet I'd like that, should it ever come to pass. I have no home to offer but should you find yourself near the 22nd again, the first round is on me."

      The duchess laughed. "I was on the other side of the river during our little contretemps, Sergeant. Your 'first round' was nearly my last. That was as close to your 22nd as I'd ever like to be."

      "Perhaps it's best we each stay on our own side of the river, then."

      "If only we could agree on which river that is. Farewell, Sergeant."

      "Farewell, Duchess."

      Eldest watched as the envoys and their horses boarded the ferry, then grew smaller and smaller as they crossed the river.

      "Hey Queenswoman!" the Duchess's voice echoed across the water. "How many Queenslanders does it take to light a candle?"

      "I hardly know, Duchess, how many would that be?" she hollered back.

      "None! They're always in the dark!" came the reply.

      Eldest grinned and swept her horse to one side to yell back. "Hey, Immie-girl! What do you call an Immomain boy who can run faster than his sisters?"

      "I have a feeling you'll tell me, Sergeant, whether I wish to know or not!" came the Duchess' voice, drifting across the waters.

      "True enough! You call him a virgin!"

      "Fuck you with an ivory bone, Queenswhore!"

      "You first with a sausage, Immie-bitch!"

      Laughter echoed across the water as they rode back to the encampment.

Chapter Text

      Once the last Imperial regiment had departed it was time for the 22nd to follow suit. Unlike their earlier march to get to the Border their return trip was almost leisurely. Not only was the urgency gone, but the weather that has so plagued the 22nd earlier had given up its attempts to drown them. As if to make up for its earlier churlishness, clear days, mild temperatures and dry roads greeted them. The conditions were so favorable, in fact, that despite their leisurely pace they made almost as good time returning to the Bright River as they had racing to the Border. Not that they would return to their winter quarters at Shiloh.  Once they reached the river they would simply start their march north to relieve the lake garrisons at Marisburg, their long-delayed summer posting… Though it would really be a late fall and winter posting by the time they got there.

      “So what’s Marisburg like?” asked Apple one evening around the fire.

      “Beautiful in the summer,” commented Herra, stirring the fire. “Cool lake breezes, sparkling water, a prosperous, well-laid out town, thriving lake trade.”

      “They’re much freer with the menfolk, too,” chimed in Catherine. “Oftimes you can see a man without a veil there. I saw a boy unveiled there once, shopping with his sisters. He had the prettiest eyes, and even smiled at me!”

      “You always say they smile at you.”

      “Well, they do!” Cat defended herself. “Boys recognize quality when they see it.”

      “Says the lonely virgin.”

      “Hey, wait until I’m awarded my Order of the Sword, then we’ll see who’s a virgin! They’ll have to close down the crib; half the boys will be useless by the time I’m done with them!”

      “Fancy saloons, good whiskey, and there’s a whore for every purse… But you’ll get what you pay for.” was Rose’s comment.

      “Sooo… Should be an easy posting?” Apple ventured.

      “Holy Mothers, no,” Meg told her sourly. “They use it as a punishment detail.”

      “Build up those back muscles now, you’ll need them,” agreed Rose.

      “And pray to the Prophets that Supply gets our cold-weather gear in time, or this is going to be a very long winter.”

      Apple looked from woman to woman, confused. “But you said…”

      “It’s lovely in the spring and summer,” Herra clarified. “It’s hellish in winter. It gets so cold your tits’ll cut glass, and then there’s the snow. Lots and lots and lots of snow. Something to do with the lake, they say. Every storm is worse than the last and we,” she grimaced, “have to show how civic-minded the Queen’s Army is, so we get called out for every single one of them.”

      “So… this is a punishment? I thought we did good, on the Border.”

      “We did… but welcome to the Army. No good deed goes unpunished. Sometimes you just get serviced by destiny. If the Imomains hadn’t invaded we would have had the spring/summer posting at Marisburg, then some luckless bad-odor regiment would’ve gotten the winter posting while we wintered warm and comfy at Shiloh. But with all the reinforcements thrown out of kilter, the Queens *have* to plug all the holes. It’ll be late fall by the time we get there. We get the winter posting, simple as that.”

      “It’s not all bad, though. Someone high up knows we’re getting the business end of the bone, and is trying to make it up to us. Word is the 22nd’s crèche and crib are being moved to meet us there. That’s expensive, so you know we’re in good odor, winter posting or no.”

      “I wondered why the women in Supply seemed so happy.”

      “You have women who haven’t seen their daughters in six months. Of course they’re happy.”

      “Not to mention the women looking for daughters of their own. Bea, you going to try again?”

      Bea gave a pensive sigh. “Luck’s gotta change. Seventh time has to be the charm, right?”

      “You still planning on using #1616… What’s his name?”

      “Why would I know? Or care? No, I’ve put in for the one I wanted in the beginning, the pretty runaway, #1626. I think his name’s Tansy, or Thistle… something like that, some herb name. I was swayed by #1616’s breeding record, but obviously it isn’t working for me. If I have to have some stinking, sweaty male rutting on top of me, it might as well be a pretty one!”

      “You don’t have to put up with that,” Rose told her. “Just tell the governess you want him chained, and mount him instead. Easier, less painful, safer.”

      Bea grimaced. “I could, but Governess Brown insists that if you want a baby, rutting on top is best. Something to do with the seed pooling, and after six tries I need all the help I can…” she broke off, seeing Apple’s stricken look. “…and here I am rattling on about women’s matters in front of tender ears.” She gave Apple’s hand a pat. “I know it sounds awful, but it’s really not as bad as they say.”

      “No,” Apple murmured quietly, looking faintly sick. “It sounds like it’s a good deal worse.”

Chapter Text

      Once they reached the river the northern road took them towards Marisburg and as always the Rangers led the way. For a few days all they had to report was an occasional broken-down dray, but towards midday on the fourth that changed. Looking up as they rode Eldest spotted a lone rider coming down the road towards them, dressed in an army blue coat and the yellow-striped trousers of the cavalry. With a nod to Becca, she touched heels to her horse and trotted forward to greet her.

      The trooper, a lean, spare woman with the air of a veteran, reined in her horse. "Honors to the Queens," she said curtly. "Corporal Duggins, 3rd cavalry."

      "Honors to the Queens," Eldest replied. "Sergeant Eldest, 1st regiment, Queen's Rangers."

      "I'm looking for the 22^nd Shiloh. Would you happen to be their point?"

      "We are," replied Eldest. "Their van is an hour or so behind us."

      The corporal nodded, patting her jacket pocket. "I have dispatches for Colonel Wellsbury." 

      Eldest signaled Becca forward. "Becca, escort corporal Duggins to the Colonel without delay."

      Becca gave her a breezy "Aye, Sergeant," and two rode off together while Eldest watched them go.

      "What do you suppose that was about?" wondered Hope where she rode beside Eldest.

      Eldest shrugged. "We'll find out soon enough," but it rankled. As Queen's Rangers, they usually had the highest currency of information. To be depending on others for it was counter to how things were supposed to work.

      She wasn't wrong. A little more than an hour later Becca returned on a fresh horse and at a brisk trot, handing written orders to Eldest while reporting them verbally.

      "We've been ordered across the river. We have to go back to the Greenhaven ferry road, scout it and warn the ferry captains they're about get all the business their hearts can handle. Then we're to see how many local barges we can commandeer and get a report back to the Colonel soonest."

      "Across the river?" Eldest wondered, reviewing the orders, written in the Colonel's usual hasty scrawl.

      "With all due speed," confirmed Becca.

      Eldest reined her horse around. "Nan and Whisper are a few minutes ahead. You go gather them in, then meet us at the ferry."

      Becca set off at a canter while Eldest whistled in her outriders and herded them back to the Ferry road, already wincing inside. The ferry women would be ecstatic; even with the Queen's discount, ferrying the regiment would be a very nice payday for them. The bargewomen, though, hated having their schedules interrupted by army commandeers, and they always wanted exorbitant fees to make up for it...even though the fees were far in excess of the inconvenience they were actually experiencing. So it was shocking to arrive at Greenferry and have bargewomen coming up to her and volunteering their barges

      "You know I can't offer anything more than standard rates," she told them wonderingly.

      The bargewoman, a hard-faced heavyset woman spat tobacco juice. "Hell, trooper, if you could promise me a hunnard percent you'd catch them Blackwood bitches what burned Lawrence to the ground, I'd ferry you across fer free."

      "Lawrence?" Eldest asked sharply. Lawrence was a small fishing and trade village. "What happened to Lawrence?"

      "Hell, ain't you heard? Marge Blackwood and her crew o' murderin' harpies came in and took over the town. They stole the trade office safe and burned half the buildings to the ground,"

      "Holy Mothers."

      "An' thet ain't even the warst o' it. They murdered a full two score o' townsfolk, including all the Chandler mothers. They was trying to snatch either the pa or the little boy, maybe both. The middle sisters got the menfolk to safety, but the mothers and most of the eldest sisters died when ol' Marge set the house afire."

      "Sweet mercy. Now I understand why we've been ordered over the river with such speed."

      The riverwoman nodded. "Aye. So don't you fret. Standard rates be just fine... this time," she amended. "The Chandlers was popular folk among us bargewomen, an honest-run trade office's a rare thing."

      "Will they be able to recover?"

      "I reckon that partly depends on whether you army types c'n find the loot before Marge and her women drink or whore it away, but even if you caint, they's got a chance. With the mothers dead, they can sell their Pa for a stake. He's only thirty-five and a widower thet young's rare as icicles in July."

      Eldest nodded. Widows, alas, were quite common but widowers exceedingly rare. With eight or more wives to a husband the chance that the husband would outlive all his wives was very remote, even as young as men were married. Even if they did, they were likely quite old by that time, past breeding age. A young widower, especially one with a proven track record of healthy children and even a boy, would fetch a price almost as large as a virgin boy, and maybe even greater. It would be hard on the Chandler girls though, particularly the youngest. Eldest herself, fathered out of a Sword crib, could not image having a loving father, then being forced by necessity to sell him away from the family.

      Fawn couriered her report back to the Colonel, and as the lead elements of the 22nd arrived the ferries and barges were ready. Greenferry was barely more than a hamlet, just a cluster of homes and a dry goods store but still all the women and a smattering of mismatched, crib-fathered children came out to cheer them on, waving kerchiefs or queen's banners along with bloodthirsty suggestions as to what to do with the Blackwood Gang when they were caught.

      "Quite a change from "Heddie hide the menfolk, the Army's come to town," chuckled Bea, watching the spectacle.

      Eldest nodded. "It's Tommi this and Tommi that and Tommi mind your ways, but it's 'thank you Mistress Atkins' when the band begins to play." she quoted the ancient poem.

      “Ever the lot of a soldier,” agreed Bea, “so let’s enjoy it while we can.” They rode through the town, waving back at their admirers and setting themselves up as traffic guards at the waterfront. Horses and riders went to the ferries, troopers and wagons to the barges. Soon the streets were packed with the troopers and train of the 22nd, waiting their turn at for the crossing, and Eldest's voice was hoarse from shouting.

      “Sergeant!” came a call from the crowd, and Eldest turned to see a harried-looking Blackberry threading her way through the throng along with two of the Colonel’s adjutants and detail of sergeants.

      “Eldest! There you are! Colonel’s orders- we’re to take over traffic and loading, she wants you and Major Kiverly across the river, scouting for campsites.”

      Eldest ran the opposite embankment through her mind’s eye. Across the river they would arrive at Greenhaven, a modest-sized river town about halfway between the larger towns of Heron Landing and Annaboro. Outside of the town there wasn’t much there, just farms and pasture. It shouldn’t be too hard to find a place to encamp, though they’d be spending more of the Queen’s coin compensating some farming family for the damage to their pasture.

      “Do we know where we’re bound, yet?” she asked.

      Blackberry grimaced, nodding. “The Blackwoods are holed up in the Naval Reserve.”

      A chill went through Eldest. “The Children’s Forest? Isn’t that supposed to be haunted?”

      “It’s haunted by the Blackwoods now, that’s for sure. They strung up several of the Queen’s Justice that went in after them and they’ve been using the Royal Marines for target practice ever since.”

      “Royal Marines? Lobsterbacks? Why in Hera’s name would they send marines into a forest?

      “Apparently a banner of marines was what the princess had with her when she found out about Lawrence.”

      “Princess?” returned Eldest sharply.

      Blackberry nodded. “Princess Halley, second oldest of the Queen’s surviving daughters.”

      Eldest searched her brain, recalling the story from the Herald. “Isn’t she the one who was hideously scarred and almost killed in the bombing?”

      “That’s the one. She was apparently chasing river smugglers when news of Lawrence came in. They tried to block the Blackwood’s retreat and almost succeeded, but the gang made it back to the forest and have been playing merry hob ever since. It’s on her orders that we were diverted across the river.”

      “An outlaw gang is standing off a full banner of marines? That doesn’t sound right.”

      “Rumor is that Marge Blackwood is an Army deserter; unfortunately she knows what she’s doing. But the real problem is that the gang seems to have acquired modern arms, a lot of them, mostly Henrietta 44’s.”

      “That sounds bad.”

      Blackberry winced. “It is. You know what they say about the Henrietta: load it on Herasday, then shoot all week.  The Blackwoods know the forest and the ground is tailor-made for guerrilla warfare. Hilly, rocky, old stone sheep walls everywhere. They say the marines have lost a file’s worth of women.”

      “Then we’d better get there. Lobsterbacks in a forest are probably about as useful as nipples on a man.”

      Blackberry chuckled as she and the sergeants with her took over directing the traffic while she and Bea rode for the ferries.

Chapter Text

      Finding a place to camp that night hadn’t been difficult. From there they marched north past the river town of Heron Landing. As they marched the land grew rockier, less settled and more wooded. They passed the little village of Northaven and headed east, leaving the river valley and heading towards the lake country when, abruptly, they arrived at a modest military encampment atop a broad hill, just outside a thick, hilly, forbidding forest. Red-coated Royal Marines challenged them for an awkward moment. There was always a certain rivalry between the Marines and the Army, if for no other reason than the close relations between the Queens and the Marines. Objectively it made sense, Queensland began as a naval power, after all. As a general rule, though, the Marines were not pleased to see the Army and the Army were not pleased to see the Marines- until the shooting started, when all rivalry was set aside and they became sisters in arms once more.

      All of which meant if they were pleased to see you, it meant that the sewage had well and truly hit the paddlewheel.

      The marines seemed very, very happy to see them.

      By the time the Rangers had finished laying out the camp the first elements of the 22nd, accompanied by the Colonel, arrived. The trenching started immediately, establishing a defensible perimeter and enlarging the smaller Marine encampment. Meanwhile, the specialists of the regiment- the mess cooks, supply, hostlers and engineers -worked to reestablish their respective fiefdoms, making the camp a home.

      While the regiment worked on settling in, the Colonel was summoned to the command tent and as usual Eldest was invited along. There they were greeted by Marine Major Drummond. Eldest raised brows at that. A banner was normally the command of a captain bannerette, or -what was that odd marine equivalent rank? Commander. Yes, commander. A full major in charge of a banner was unusual, though perhaps it made sense if that banner was tasked with protecting one of the few remaining royal princesses. One of only three adult princesses, no less.

      Major Drummond began the meeting. “Colonel, officers, Her Royal Highness, Princess Halley, bids me welcome you and sends her regrets that she cannot attend in person at this time. She is undergoing treatment for her wounds sustained in the Durham Theater bombing and is indisposed. I’ve been ordered to brief you on the tactical situation as it stands, answer any questions you may have, and then, as senior officer of the Queen’s forces present, to place myself and my banner under your command, Colonel Wellsbury.”

      Eldest did a little mental intake of breath, though she kept her face impassive. The princess could easily have kept both chains of command separate under her authority. Placing them in a unified command was a signal of confidence in Colonel Wellsbury, but also a sign of just how bad the situation really was.

      The Colonel herself accepted this with only a slight widening of the eyes and a gruff “Understood.”

      The Major began the briefing, motioning them all to a crude, partially drawn map of the forest and its surroundings. “The Reserve Forest was established over a century ago, in the aftermath of the sleeping sickness when the area was quarantined to prevent the spread of the disease. Prior to that all this was pasture, supporting dozens of dairy and sheep holding families. When the disease struck, most of those families were wiped out or fled, and the title to the land reverted back to the Queens. There were a few attempts early on to reclaim the land, but the disease wasn’t dead… just waiting. What was left of the families that tried withdrew, and the Queens established the Reserve, leaving the land to forest. The forest matured and the last reported case of sleeping sickness was over fifty years ago. The Forest has been thought free of contagion since then, though that’s been kept quiet to discourage woods tramps and the like from moving in.”

      The Major took a breath, scowling. “Unfortunately, we’re not the only ones who know that. As near as we can tell, Marge Blackwood’s gang started using the forest as a retreat two years ago. They were nothing but a minor annoyance until about a year ago, when they somehow acquired modern arms, mostly Henrietta 44’s. The rifles bring a lot of prestige among the river trash, and that allowed her to recruit a much larger band than is normal.

    “We think she had about thirty women when she hit Lawrence; we know the Chandlers and few other locals took out four of them. Our own operations have killed six that we know of, and likely wounded others. That leaves some twenty women, unless she’s recruited more since then. They’re well-armed and, unfortunately, well-led though the quality of her individual women is about what you’d expect.”

      The Major took a breath and continued. “My banner was escorting the princess and chasing river pirates when we got news of Lawrence. We left the river and tried to cut the gang off, but we were unsuccessful. They got to the forest and have been playing hide-and-go-seek ever since. A troop of the Queen’s Justice from Northaven tried going in after them… seven got out alive, we found the others strung up. The princess takes that right personal; she says we’re not leaving until the Blackwoods are hanging in their turn.”

      “We heard your losses were severe.”

      “Sixteen dead, twenty-two wounded. We are still combat-effective,” the Major replied tightly. “My women want to fight. These… animals… need killing.”

      The Colonel nodded gravely. “Please inform the princess that together we will do everything in our power to bring these criminals to justice.”

      “It won’t be easy,” warned the Major. “The Blackwoods know the forest. If you go into the forest in strength you don’t find them at all. If you split your forces down to cover more ground you expose them to ambushes. You’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t.”

      “It’s important that we learn from your experience. I don’t want to pay for the same lessons twice. You said you’ve killed six. How?”

      “Luck played a part in it,” The Major conceded grudgingly. “Two patrols got lost in the thickets and ended up accidentally trapping a group of Blackwoods between them. My women killed four and as near as we can tell wounded two others. We would have taken them prisoner but Marge, or whoever was in command, shot her own women rather than let us take them. The rest slipped away in the confusion.”

      “Excellent. That’s a start, at any rate,” the Colonel stood to pore over the map. “Can we do the same? Deliberately this time, and on a larger scale?”

      The Major sidled up to the table herself. “I haven’t had the numbers to make a serious go of it. The first time was a fluke; the Blackwoods haven’t allowed themselves to be caught like that again.”

      “We have a company of cavalry, as well.”

      “You’re better off dismounting them and using them as regular infantry. Horses are worse than useless in the forest.”

      “We also have a troop of Rangers,” the Colonel nodded to Eldest.

      “They at least will be useful, if the half the stories I’ve heard are true.” She pursed a frown and drifted closer to the table. “It doesn’t look that bad,” she warned, gesturing at the map. “But in total it’s several hundred square miles. A troop, or even a regiment, is a drop in the bucket. You can’t cover the whole thing. You can’t even begin to cover the whole thing.”

      “There are more of us then there are of them.”

      “That’s what I thought, coming here.”

      “Can we get more women?”

      “In time, yes. Immediately, no. Because of the Imomain Incident, all the reinforcements are messed up; we’re not sure of where the relieved regiments are, and the ones where we do know where they are need to stay there. We *will* be getting more marines from Mayfair, but not for some weeks. We were very lucky to be able to intercept and commandeer you.”

      The Colonel frowned, looking over the map once more. Far, far too much of it was blank. “Sergeant Eldest, I need better maps.”

      “We won’t let you down, ma’am.”

Chapter Text

      Unfortunately, saying and doing were two very separate things. The forest was vast, and mapping it slow. It quickly became apparent the Blackwoods were laired in the northwest spur of the forest; the hilliest, densest, most difficult to map and patrol section. A mix of hardwoods and pine, the section called “the Blackwood”, and from which the gang had taken their name, was a leaf-carpeted maze of hills and ravines, liberally strewn with gray, lichen-covered boulders. Old stone sheep walls ran like arteries throughout, offering perfect cover for snipers and impeding pursuit. They quickly realized it would take months, if not years, to map the whole thing, even without the risk of guerrillas shooting at them. A call had gone out for more Ranger reinforcements, but there were never enough Rangers to go around and they would be slow in arriving. Meanwhile, they had to make do with what they had.

      The good news was that Nan had hit upon the idea of combining maps. She’d started from a treasure trove of old land records she’d unearthed in a dusty vault at Northaven. With those as a base, they pieced together land records, logger’s maps, water surveys and their own efforts to get a workable idea of the terrain. It wasn’t nearly as good as what a proper survey could have created, but it was far better than what they could have hoped to produce otherwise and in far shorter a time. The bad news was that while the Rangers mapped, Major Drummond’s warnings turned out to be all too prophetic.

      They lost their first woman to a sniper’s bullet, then two more to a rockslide that the Blackwoods probably hadn’t even triggered. They tried overlapping patrols, to cover one another. Inevitably the patrols would lose contact in the thick woods and scrub, and the Blackwoods would be waiting. They tried larger patrols and found nothing. They tried small bases of women in a bid to control the land, and the Blackwoods preyed on the most isolated. They tried massive sweeps like the old game drives, only to discover crude explosives planted along the trails, tin cans packed with glass and nails, rigged to makeshift percussion-cap firing mechanisms.

      All of that led to a steady stream of casualties every few days, one and two at a time, a steady dribble drabble of death and maiming, sapping morale. Not that the Blackwoods had it entirely their own way; a patrol from Fox Company had stopped for lunch and two Blackwoods blundered into them for a change. The women had died under a hail of bullets before the patrol corporal could even think of taking them prisoner. A loss, but probably wise for all that; the repeating Henriettas gave the Blackwoods a deadly advantage in long and medium range engagements, before pistols could come into play. The princess had sent to the Wainwright armory in North Branch for any and all repeating rifles that had been completed in response to the Queen’s order, and they’d even sent riders to Northford and Heron Landing and buy up any civilian models, but that was only a handful. Not one troop in five had a repeating weapon. Troopers being troopers, that weapon was promptly dubbed ‘the bone’ and the woman who carried it ‘the whore”, but that was the only humor to be found in an otherwise bleak month.

      Not that this month was shaping up to be any better. A detail of women from Bravo Company had somehow gotten separated from their patrol despite strict orders to stay together. In her more charitable moments, Eldest figured the dense forest and rocky terrain had played them false… But the more likely explanation was simply that they had tried to desert. If they had wanted to get out of the army to avoid confronting the Blackwoods, though, they failed. A hurriedly-assembled search party of Rangers and the rest of their troop found all four dead, impaled on sharpened saplings. Around their necks were crudely-lettered signs with the taunting message ‘married a Blackwood husband.’ The only consolation in the horror of it all was that the medicians were certain that the women were dead before their bodies were violated. Nonetheless finding the women like that and their dead, slack expressions haunted Eldest’s dreams. With the mapping done her Rangers were being increasingly parceled out as scouts. How long would it be until she, too, had women to mourn?

Chapter Text

      The answer was not long in coming. A few days later they’d just finished morning muster and were busy with camp tasks when Blackberry strode up, her normally harried expression schooled to a somber one. “There’s been another Incident,” she reported thickly, handing over a note. “They’re debriefing the survivors now. Colonel wants you there.”

      There was no need to ask what she meant by ‘Incident’. After the last one, that word could have only one meaning to the 22nd. Together they hurried to the command tent while Blackberry filled her in. A mixed unit of troopers and marines, one of the newly-minted “24’s” had been sent out on a long patrol. The idea was to have a unit large enough to deal with any Blackwoods while still being small enough to maneuver effectively. The concept had seemed to be sound and Eldest had been preparing to divvy up her own troop to support them. Clearly something had gone wrong. They entered the command tent to find the ashen-faced lieutenant in command of the 24 just beginning her report.

      “We started taking fire from two or three rifles, just near misses. We charged their positions and flushed them out, no problem. They retreated up one of those rocky ravines and we pursued…”

      Eldest winced, already seeing what was coming. Sweet mothers, did they teach them nothing at Officer’s School? How much more obvious of a trap did she need?

      “…we reached the neck of the gorge, and then, then there were dozens of them, every rock and crevice opened up. We retreated, but… but when we reached the bottom we were five women short. We tried going back in, but were forced back. By the time we got patrols over the gorge, above them, they were gone. That’s… that’s when we found our missing women. All five. Judge… judging from, from the blood, we think at least two were…”

      “Steady,” growled the Colonel. “You’re a Queen’s officer. What did you find?”

      Eldest cringed inside, looking for something, anything, to distract her from the lieutenant's report. She turned to the map, the white paper marred by flagged pins. There were several colors, but mostly there were reds and blacks, the reds marking skirmishes and the blacks, deaths. There were far, far too many blacks, making ugly arcs, concentrated in the Blackwood. There ugly lines of red and black ran like arteries atop ridges and along ravines, the scattered debris of skirmishes, booby traps and ambushes. Even as she watched a grim-faced Blackberry updated the map, pushing black pins along a narrow ravine as the traumatized lieutenant struggled to finish.

      Wishing she could stop her ears, the flags blurred in her vision, teasing the tactician’s part of her brain, the part that looked for something, anything, to focus on but women violated with tree trunks. The lines blurred and sharpened, telling her nothing and yet… there, that arc, there. And that one, there. A third, there… Out of place, but there. They followed the ridgelines… The ambush. A textbook ambush, literally. Oh Mothers above…

      The lieutenant took a deep shuddering breath. “All five, im-impaled. With the signs. One was… one was still twitching. We got her down but… too late,” she finished helplessly, the officers around her stone-faced in silence.

      “Bait and ‘bush,” Eldest murmured to herself in the sudden quiet, the scattered pieces of the lieutenant’s report, of the last six weeks, falling into place at last.

      “Bait and what?” scowled Major Drummond.

      Eldest looked up, voice sharpening. “Bait and ‘bush. It’s a Ranger tactic. Leave out a small force as bait, then have them retreat, luring their pursuers into ambush. We keep hearing that Marge Blackwood is an army deserter, and from the skill with which she’s handling her women I think that’s likely.”

      “You think Marge is an ex Ranger?” asked the Colonel skeptically.

      “Perhaps. Or maybe just someone who’s read the Whistler Manual.” Eldest gestured angrily at the table. “Look at it, all of it, from day one. All of that’s from the manual. This is the exact same shit Tea and her sisters were pulling on the False Eldest in the lead-up to Nettle’s Run.”

      “Even if that’s true, how does this help us?”

      Eldest blew out a long breath, turning back to the map. How, indeed? And then it clicked. “’Don’t shit where you sleep,’ she murmured. “Tea wrote a whole chapter on that.”

      “Blackberry,” Eldest glanced over to the Colonel’s aide. “The pins show us where the attacks happened. Do you have a way to show us *when* they happened?”

      Blackberry gave her a confused look. “They’re all in the last six weeks, since Lawrence.”

      Eldest leaned over the table, gesturing at the pins. “I need more than that. I need to know to the day, to the hour if possible, when these attacks happened.”

      Still confused, Blackberry pulled out a sheaf of reports and more pins. Together they matched dates to colors and when they ran out of colors to symbols. Finishing, Eldest stepped back. Yes, there, there and there. “Thought so,” she murmured in grim satisfaction.

      The Colonel’s eyes flashed at her as the other officers gathered around the table. “What do you see?”

      She traced out the different colored pins. “There’s a pattern to it. About every two or three days. And the attacks from a particular time come in arcs. See?” She gestured, tracing one out.

      “The attacks follow the terrain,” Major Drummond disagreed, pointing to a line along one ridge.

      “Yes that’s funneled by terrain but even then, this one here,” she pointed, “happens earlier than this one here, even though the first is harder to get to.”

      “That doesn’t mean anything.”

      “With respect, I think it does. What we’re looking at is travel times.”

      The Colonel broke in before the Major could reply. “What do you mean, Sergeant?”

      “We’ve been looking for the Blackwoods here,” she gestured, at the hilly northwest spur of the forest. “I don’t think they’re there at all.”

      “All these attacks have been by ghosts then?” demanded the Major, frustrated.

      “If not here, then where?” pressed the Colonel.

      “I’m not sure. But somewhere about a day’s travel from the Blackwood. Somewhere to the east. Somewhere… here,” she indicated the midsection of the forest. “Somewhere in the Dales. They march in, hit us, then leave to rest and recover while we flail around trying to find them, running into their booby traps as we do so.” She turned to the Colonel. “Let me take a patrol. I’d like to check it out.”

      “No. We need them here,” Major Drummond cut in. “The patrols with Ranger scouts are the ones that aren’t being cut to ribbons and the troopers know that. We need them for morale, if nothing else.”

      The Colonel hesitated. “I’d have to agree,” she concluded reluctantly. “It would take you a week or more to go and come back. The troops are already on edge and this is going to make it worse. I need you here.”

      Eldest considered. "We can cut that time in half if we ride there."

      Wellsbury looked askance at that. "In these woods, horses have been about as useful as tits on a boy.”

      "In the Blackwood that's true, but in the Dales I'm told the forest is more open. We'll ride in, then dismount to patrol."

      "That'll leave you short a woman to look after the horses."

      Eldest thought on that and a solution offered itself. "We'll take Apple to handle the horses. She's been nagging me to do 'real ranger things' long enough. As long as we’ve got a plainsgirl, we might as well put her to good use.”

      The Colonel gave her a rare smile. "You do know she doesn't look a bit like a plainsgirl, don't you? Not with that hair."

      Eldest had to agree. "She really doesn’t, but orphans have their pride. It may be all they have, but it’s theirs. If she says she’s a plainsgirl, that’s good enough for me. I've long since given up trying to sort out what's truth and what's tall tales with that girl. But whatever else you can say about her, she is good with horses."

      The Colonel grunted agreement, turning back to the map, contemplating the proposal. Eldest awaited her decision, long in coming. Finally she ventured, “If a patrol is too much, let me take just a detail. Four women. We can go and be back in two days, maybe three. Let me check it out, that’s all I’m asking.”

      “Take your whole troop,” the Colonel responded curtly.

      “Ma’am?”

      “Your whole troop. Every woman.” She snapped a pointer down angrily on the map. “If that’s where the Blackwoods are hiding I want to know it, and if by chance you do run into them, I want you to have enough women to fight your way free. Go. I need a few days to re-train my officers anyway,” she scowled at the lieutenant. “Find these animals for me, Eldest. One way or the other. Just be sure to be back no later than noon the day after tomorrow. From now on, no patrol goes out without at least one Ranger to scout for them. I’ll need you and your women for that.”

      “Yes, ma’am!”

Chapter Text

      Eldest strode from the command tent, her stride lengthening, threading her way through the encampment until she reached their own camp. Her women looked up from morning tasks, caring after gear, restocking supplies.

      “Gear up, ladies!” she called. “The Colonel’s let us off the leash. The whole troop, and we’re not going to let her down. You have half an hour to be armed, saddled and ready to ride. The trooper who’s even a minute late is on my extra duty list for the week. Move, girls!”

      Her women scattered as she looked about for the troop member she didn’t see. “Drummer Girl Apple!” she bellowed.

      “Here, Sergeant!” came her voice, behind some of the tents. Eldest rounded them to find Apple with her detail of drummer girls. Jasper was tacked and saddled while the other drummer girls led mules facing her, clearly getting ready for an outing. Convenient.

      “Yes Sergeant?” she asked.

      “We’re moving out. I’ll be wanting you with us.”

      Apple’s face fell. “But Sergeant, I was plannin’ on taking my detail out on maneuvers.”

      “Is this this same drummer girl who’s been badgering me to do real ranger stuff?”

      “You mean *with you*? With the troop? On patrol?” her face was transformed by an infectious grin as she turned to the others. “Corporal of Drummer Girls Stray!”

      “Yes, Sergeant Drover!”

      “You’re in command. Continue the mission without me. I want to hear a ‘good report’ before you’re done!”

      The girl called Stray broke out into a wide grin, as if at some private joke. “Ay-yup, Sergeant; you’ll hear a ‘good report’ from each and every one of us!”

      Apple harrumphed. “Excellent, I expect nothing less! Carry on!” she commanded, waving them away before turning back to Eldest. “We’re going on patrol? Where? When? What do I need? What do you need? What do you want me to do?”

      It was like dealing with an over-enthusiastic puppy. “The women will be bringing up their horses. You’re in charge of the provisioning. Make sure each trooper has two days rations, blankets and field canvas.”

      “Yes, Sergeant! Standard load on the ammo?”

      It was a good question and spoke well of what Apple had been learning from her time in Supply. Eldest’s first instinct was to pack as much ammo as possible, but ammunition was heavy and they were going to scout, not fight a war. They needed to travel as lightly as possible, especially if they were going to meet the Colonel’s strict timetable.

      “I want each woman to carry a standard load for her long gun, and a double load of pistol,” she decided. “Then I want an additional standard load and a triple load of pistol in her saddlebags.” The standard load was a hundred rounds of carbine and fifty rounds of pistol. The extra pistol ammo wouldn’t add that much more weight to the saddlebags, but it would give them an extra reserve in a skirmish.

      “Yes Sergeant, I think we have that in our own lockers. But I’m still coming with you?” she asked hopefully.

      “You are. I have a… feeling, and we’re going to go check it out. Not that you’ll be patrolling with us,” she warned. “You’ll be in charge of the horses. But that Fillybranch rifle of yours comes with you, and it’s to be loaded. Clear?”

      Apple sobered. “Clear, Sergeant!”  

Chapter Text

      It was closer to an hour before they were fully ready to depart and, though she chastised her women for that, Eldest was secretly pleased. Any other troop would have taken three times that, perhaps as much as a day, to be ready to move on such short notice. As it was it wasn’t even midmorning when they thundered out of the encampment and headed, not north and west as all their other patrols had, but due east to the Dales: Three valleys carved by the rivers that fed Lake Ami.

      Once out of the camp they followed old market roads that had been repurposed into logging roads, their horses’ footfalls softened by leaf mold and bracken. The canopy covered them as they wended deeper and deeper into the forest, following the contours of the land. It was difficult to believe that a mere century ago all this was open farm and field, supporting dozens of sheep and dairy families. Of course, that was before the sleeping sickness. Occasionally they passed old stone foundations, the stones often bearing the blackened marks of fire. Families and authorities desperate to check the diseases’ advance often burned infected houses, though in truth it seemed to do little good. 

      Soon the roads became trails, then the trails petered out and they trooped through the forest loam. Eldest checked the map occasionally, hoping their cobbled-together creation was accurate. Meg nudged her mount closer to get a look.

      “Where *are* we going, Sergeant?”

      Eldest considered, halting her horse and unfolding the map further. “That’s a good question. Check my thinking. Assume that the Blackwoods have read the Ranger manual. If the Blackwood is the stalking ground, where’s the lay-to?”

      “Anywhere but the stalking ground.”

      “But they can’t fly between the two. They have to walk, perhaps as much as a day.”

    Meg’s eyes widened in sudden understanding, then leaned over to cover a section of the map with her hand. “Somewhere here.”

      “That’s my thinking.”

      “It’s still a huge area. Where do we start?”

      “Marge doesn’t have military trained women. She has thugs, trash and ne’er-do-wells. Where would you start?”

      Meg pursed her lips thinking. Then she pointed to the farthest of the three valleys. “Here, the Merrick River and Merrickdale. Easier hiking than the ridges, far from us, nice, quiet and isolated.”

      Eldest grinned. “Thanks for the check.” She rolled up the map, motioning her women forward, looking for what the map said was old Merrick market road.

      It took the better part of the day to get there. The was troop was Ranger quiet as they threaded through old woods roads and loggers paths, silent except for the occasional calling bird or startled squirrel. It took so long that she was beginning to worry they’d missed it or their mapping efforts had played them false, but then, sure enough they topped a rise and they beheld a small river set in a shallow valley before them. Eldest dismounted and motioned her women to do the same.

      “Apple, take the horses,” she ordered. “We’ll go on foot from here. Meg, take your patrol and search upstream. Mine will search downstream. You can split into details if you think it makes sense but nothing smaller. Stay close enough to be able to support one another. Remember the Blackwoods are fond of ‘bait and ‘bush’. Don’t let them sucker you in.”

      Meg acknowledged but Rose broke in. “What exactly are we looking for, Sergeant?”

      Eldest pursed her lips. What, indeed?

      “The Blackwoods are playing hide and go seek. But they have to have a home base somewhere. They need a secure place to store food, ammo, loot… They need a place they can rest and recover, same as we do. That’s what we’re looking for.”

      “With the size of this forest, looking for a needle in a haystack would be easier.”

      “It would, except the Blackwoods have to go to and from this particular needle. There’s a pattern to the timing of their raids. It might be coincidence, or… It might be that they have to hike as much as a day to get to the Blackwood and I’m betting they don’t shit where they sleep.”

      Rose nodded slowly. “If their base is here they avoid all our patrols in the Blackwood, but they have to go to and from and we might find a trail, especially if they’re careless.”

      “Exactly.”

      Stolid Rose gave her a rare smile. “Well then, Sergeant, we’ll just have to see what we can do about that, hadn’t we?”

      With a grin Eldest checked her ticker against Meg’s, then took her patrol down the valley while Meg took hers up. In two hours they would meet back with Apple and the horses and share what they had found, if anything.

Chapter Text

      What they found was very little. When their time was up they’d hiked back to the meeting point where Meg and her patrol were already waiting.

      “We found nothing but game trails, old logging cuts and small abandoned camps, probably woods-tramps. Nothing even close to the size the Blackwoods would need. You?”

      “More of the same,” Meg reported. “The largest camp we found might have held eight or so women, but it’s been abandoned for months if not years.”

      Eldest scowled. “All of ours were smaller than that, but so much for fear of the sleeping sickness keeping the tramps away.”

      “That was a vain hope anyway. It’s been known for some time that the sickness burned itself out. Besides, it mostly struck menfolk and children, and woods-tramps don’t have much of either.”

      “Thankfully.”

      “What now, Sergeant?”

      Eldest looked up at the fading light through the trees, discouraged. Perhaps Major Drummond had been right. “We find a place to camp for the night, and start back to camp in the morning. There are two more valleys on the way. We’ll search as we go and hope for better luck.”

      They found a snug little hollow and bivouacked for the night. Eldest couldn’t allow a fire, so it was cold coffee, hardtack, canned meat and a morose Apple who couldn’t cook some of the delicacies she’d grabbed for them. The night itself wasn’t any better. It turned out they’d made a mistake in billeting in a low spot. As a result they spent a fitful, abortive night slapping mosquitos and huddling under field canvas, listening to the pained whinnies of their horses, swishing tails and stamping feet in annoyance at the clouds of blood sucking insects clustering around them.

The false dawn was a definite relief as they staggered blearily through breakfast and mounted up to continue the search.

      “I swear, I’m a pound lighter”, complained Bea. “All of it gone in blood.”

      “I’m not any better,” agreed Meg. “Sergeant, do you think you could you put us in for the red badge, blood for country?”

      “Find me some Blackwoods and consider it done,” Eldest told them, grateful for the humor but determined not to let it settle into outright grousing. “Let’s see if Avendale holds any better luck.”

Chapter Text

      The valley defined by the Aven River was also bare of any evidence of Blackwoods. There was plenty of evidence of bummers and woods-tramps, so much so that Rose complained that they weren’t so much looking for a needle in a haystack as they were searching for a needle in a haystack of needles. It was discouraging, yet Eldest felt her intuition twinge again at the thought.

      “The best place to hide a book is in a library,” she told them. “We keep searching. Stay alert. We have one more valley to search and if that turns up bare, by the Mothers, we’ll search the ridges too.”

      Groans were her only answer but her women swung into their saddles with a will, riding to their second search area within the day. As they rode Eldest looked through the canopy to where the sun scattered light through the leaves. Not quite midafternoon. They’d search the last valley, then bivouac for the night.    

*          *          *

      Almost immediately the new valley began to pay better dividends than the old. The river that defined the valley was larger and obviously more trafficked than either of the others. According to the map the Fenton River, like the Merrick and the Aven, had its headwaters in the Blackwood hills. But where the others gathered at the edges the Fenton started in the heart of those hills.

      “If you wanted a highway from the Blackwood to the rest of the forest and Lake Ami in particular, this would be it,” wondered Meg. “But we aren’t more than a dozen miles from camp! The Blackwoods would have to be crazy to be here!”

      “Crazy… or crazy like foxes. Who would think to look for them here?”

      “You would, apparently. Do you still want to break into patrols to search?”

      Eldest shook her head. “We will if we have to, but let’s keep the troop together for now. Standard fan search, no one bunched up or too far away.”

      They searched upstream first. There was ample evidence of movement, trails too wide and well-travelled to be game trails. In and of itself that proved nothing with all the woods-tramps, but along one such path Nan found an unfired cartridge, clearly gone astray from an ammo belt or pouch.

      “Henrietta .44 rimfire,” she noted as she showed it to Eldest. “Mighty modern round for woods tramps.”

      “A woods tramp just might have a Henrietta,” agreed Eldest. “Pigs can fly too, if you shoot bacon out of a cannon. Meg, maximum alert and every eye peeled. We’ll follow this trail downstream.”

      The troop flowed through the woods, hugging cover as much as possible but the hackles on Eldest’s neck were at full stand even so. Almost she considered pulling out and coming back with an infantry column for backup. Reconnaissance, though, was a Ranger job. It would take too long to go and come back. The trail would be quite cold by then and having another sixty untrained women crashing around the woods would end any hope of surprise they might have had. Better to do the recon now, with what she had.

      The trail led them along the river until, abruptly, it brought them to a wide bend and shallow landing set beside a small stony cliff. The place was covered in footprints, clear evidence of where a dozen or more women had milled around before boarding rafts or canoes to continue their journey downstream.

      “A dead end,” Meg pronounced, crestfallen.

      “Looks like it,” Eldest agreed, arms folded, frowning. “We’ll have to get canoes of our own to continue. Maybe those marines will actually be useful for something besides Blackwood target practice.”

      “Or maybe the whole thing is a false trail.” Nan joined them, looking puzzled.

      “How so?”

      Nan gestured at the morass of tracks. “They go to the water, but there’s no drag or keel marks in the river mud.”

      “There’s been rain. Perhaps they were washed away?”

      “Perhaps. The trace is pretty confused, but the top tracks seem to head away from the water, not towards it.”

      Eldest looked up through the canopy. Early afternoon, but it was fall and the days were getting shorter. They were in a valley to boot, so the sun would set early for them. They ought to be finding a secure place to bivouac for the night. Hopefully a higher and better one than the night before.

      “A puzzle, and I don’t like puzzles,” she scowled. “Spread out. Make sure there’s no trail out of here they might be using to give us the slip.”

      Her women fanned out, even going so far as to scale the modest cliff but there were no sign of other trails. The trail ended at the river and that was that. It made sense; if these were the Blackwoods what better way to elude pursuit than to use the trackless river?

      If it even was the Blackwoods.

      Either way, whoever they were, they were long gone by now.

      So why did her shoulder-blades still itch?

      She checked the sun once more. They were out of time. With a last glare at the river she whistled in her women, their faces as disappointed and frustrated as her own.

      “Good job ladies, but we’re out of time. We’ll circle back, pick up Apple and the horses, then look for a site to bivouac for the night.”

      They cleaned up their own trace and trail as much as possible. It wouldn’t hold up against the truly woodscrafty, but then, the truly woodscrafty wouldn’t have left the trail these women had. That done, they headed back upstream.

Chapter Text

      They had a bad few moments returning to the glade where they’d left Apple and the horses because neither were in sight. Fortunately, she’d merely pulled them all into a thick grove of pine and had them lay down. A quick whistle and she trudged them out, handing over reins until they were all mounted once more.

      “Where to?” asked Meg. “There was that rise a half mile or so back,” she offered, though doubt colored her voice.

      Eldest shook her head. “Too small, and not high enough.” She consulted the map, checking their carefully transcribed logger’s notes. “I don’t want us crammed in like baitfish, I’ve had enough of mosquitos, and shelter for the horses would be nice. How about this?” She tapped a large concentric hill, a mile or so from their river landing.

      Meg looked it over. There was an old house site indicated there, with ‘ruins’ transcribed in logger’s script. “It’s probably some old noble families’ summer place,” she guessed, “and abandoned after the sickness. It looks good on paper, for what that’s worth.”

      Eldest grunted her agreement and rolled up the map. “It does. Mount up, ladies,” she ordered. “We’ll check it out and camp if it’s suitable.”

      The afternoon sun cast golden beams through the forest as they drew near the hill. It turned out to be surprisingly clear due to old logging cuts. Not completely clear, of course. Spindly aspens, birch and maple dotted the landscape, rising amid old stumps and yellowed, thigh-high prairie grass. After a day under the forest canopy, though, it was an enticing sight. She signaled the troop to dismount. Apple gathered up the horses and trotted them off to another copse of pine. Eldest watched her go with a nagging uneasiness. Not finding her where they expected her earlier had rattled her.

      “Apple,” she called after her, “tie them off in a line but stay alert.”

      Apple acknowledged the order with a wave and a cheerful “Ay-yup!” as Eldest turned to the rest of the troop. “Very well ladies, let’s go have a look.”

      Her women fanned out behind her as they waded through the grasses. Like much of the Reserve forest, old stone walls marked what were once fields and pastures. The site looked good on the map and even better in person. The hill was nearly circular but with a broad flat top and concentric rings of low stone sheep walls, making it eminently defensible. With the walls and good sight lines all the way down the hill they couldn’t have asked for anything better. If the ruins at the top offered a little shelter it really would be perfect.

      The sharp crack of a rifle interrupted her reverie, and instinct took over. “Cover!” she yelled, rushing forward to the nearest available, a low stone wall that was probably the remains of a shearing chute, as the rest of the troop stampeded after her. Desperately she searched for the source of the shots but the echoes from the hills masked the source, as they cracked out one after another.

      Meg fetched up beside her, cussing a blue streak.

      “Where the hell is that fire coming from?!” Eldest demanded.

      “Damned if I know.” Carbine in hand Meg risked a peek above the wall and instantly ducked as more shots plastered the wall, raining rock dust down on them.

      “Brotherfucker!” Meg spat rock dust. “She’s right opposite us, behind another wall, twenty, maybe twenty-five yards uphill.”

      “Sweet mothers. Right on top of us.”

      More shots rang out and a desperate cry sounded, downhill. “Covering fire! Covering fire now!”

      Instantly her troop levered their carbines over the wall and loosed a ragged volley, the gunwoman uphill ducking in turn as Hope, Herra and Apple dragged Peony, coughing and sputtering, to the shelter of their wall.

      “Apple!” Eldest snarled at her. “What the hell are you doing here? You’re supposed to be with the horses!”

      “I had to come! Diana, I saw her fall! And then Peony needed help!”

      “Of all the- Where is Diana?”

      “I… I don’t think she’s coming,” Apple told her, stricken. “I… I… I think she’s dead. H… her face…” Apple shivered, placing her hand over her own. “It… it wasn’t there, she finished thickly, trembling in shock.

      Eldest cursed, taking a quick inventory of her women, all of whom huddled behind their wall, pistols in hand, their carbines empty. Rose was trying to reload her weapon, but their wall was only a table-width high, and standing to reload would be suicide. Shocked, Eldest started to realize just how bad the situation was, pulling her own revolvers.

      “I think there’s only one,” Meg told her urgently. “But that has to be a Henrietta up there!”

      “We’ll overrun her then if we have to! Henrietta or no, she’ll have to reload.”

      “You there!” Eldest shouted at the upper wall, behind the shelter of their own. “This is Sergeant Eldest of the Queen’s Rangers! In the name of the Queens, lay down your weapon and surrender!”

      Her only answer was a row of shots along the stones of the wall, showering them with more stone dust.

      “That never works, why even try?!” Meg scolded, crouching low beside her.

      “It know it doesn’t, but that’s three out of a potential sixteen.  Let’s see if we can get her to waste some more.”

      “On it!” Meg poked her revolver above the wall and squeezed off a half-dozen unaimed rounds, drawing three in reply. “That’s six,” she whispered, reloading.

      “She gave us four earlier, and can’t have reloaded. Six to go, then we mob the bitch.” Eldest found a gap in the stone to peer through, and placed a row of shots along the upper wall, not more than twenty yards away. The angle of fire was lousy… the upper wall was taller than theirs and uphill, but two more shots rang out in reply. A hand signal brought her woman to full attention, crouching, pistols ready. One or two more bullets was all they needed. Carefully she eased her pistol clear of the wall…

      …and a fusillade tore the weapon from her hand. She flattened herself and huddled beside the wall, looking down at a hand she was sure would be missing fingers. They were all there, but red and stinging. A few feet behind her, her pistol lay in pieces, a heavy Henrietta slug squibbed between the cylinder and the frame.

      “Well, well, well,” came a cruel, gloating voice, drifting down to them. “What have we here? Queens’ Rangers, looking for Blackwoods? Congratulations, lickspittle whores. You’ve found ‘em. And now you’re dead. You hear me, you bitches? You’re fuckin’ dead and you’re gonna die screaming!”

Chapter Text

      For the second time in a year Eldest found herself hunkering down behind a wall, low on ammunition and despairing. Only this time it was worse. Back on the Imomain border retreat had been a viable option. That wasn’t the case here. If they tried to run the Blackwoods would have clear shots at the broads of their backs all the way down the hill and with the height advantage granted by the upper wall, they couldn’t miss. The hill was dotted with spindly second growth trees and the grasses reached their thighs, but there was nothing that they could hide behind, nothing that would shelter them from rifle fire.

      As best they could figure a troop-size deployment of women opposed them from behind the upper wall, but it was another Imomain standoff. The Blackwoods had the better position; higher ground, more cover and better weapons, but there were twenty yards of no-women’s land between them. If they came over their wall they were just as exposed as the Rangers would be, and at that short range Ranger pistols were just as deadly as a Henrietta, so the standoff dragged on.

      The Blackwoods tried flanking them, but the sides of the shearing chute gave them cover there as well. Though the Rangers couldn’t reload their carbines rapidly, they could reload them slowly, and that was enough. That left Blackwood flankers more exposed to the Rangers than the other way around and after a few tries they gave up. Instead, they concentrated their efforts on keeping the Rangers pinned while forcing them to use up their limited ammo, a game that the Blackwoods couldn’t lose in the long run. Meanwhile, Marge continued her foul-mouthed harangue from the cover of the upper wall.

      “You scared, queensbitches? You should be. Yer as fucked as the new boy in a crib, and I can’t wait to start the party. Yer gonna squeal like pigs, y’little cunts. It’s gonna take you days to die and you’ll be beggin’ fer death after the first five minutes!”

      “Gods, I wish she’d shut up!” Meg whispered savagely beside her.

      “She just wants us to waste ammo. Pass the word to the flanks, though- they’ll probably be testing us from the sides again soon.”

      Meg crawled off to see it done, slipping past Hope coming the other way. Once past Meg, Hope crawled her way over to Eldest, sheltering behind the wall as she did so.

      “Hope, keep your head down! How’s Peony?”

      “Bad,” Hope reported, face stricken. “Real bad. She’s shot in the chest, through the lung. Sergeant, I need my kit.”

      “Your kit?”

      “My full medical kit. I only brought my satchel with me. I should have brought all of it, but it’s heavy and we were only coming up to take a look and now I need it but we don’t have it and Peony’s gonna die unlesswegetit…”

      Hope’s words rushed out faster and faster until she was on the ragged edge of babbling. Eldest reached out an arm to steady her. “Hope, where is the kit?”

      Hope drew in a long shuddering breath. “In my saddlebags. With the horses.”

      Eldest glanced down the hill, down to the copse of pine trees where the horses were tethered. Between them, perhaps three hundred yards of waist and knee-high grasses interspersed with spindly aspens and maples. Little to no cover, all the way down the hill. Trying to run that gauntlet would be suicide against muzzle-loaders, let alone repeating rifles. “They might as well be on the moon,” she told Hope sadly. “You’ll have to make do with what you have, at least until nightfall.”

      “I *can’t*. There’s no way she’ll last that long. One lung’s already collapsed and the other’s going to follow suit soon! I need my lancets, gutta-percha tubing, forceps, laudanum and tannin, and I need them *now*. Please. I can make a run for it…”

      “You make a run for it and there’ll be two dead women instead of one! No, absolutely not. I will not throw away our only medician’s life for nothing. We wait until nightfall.”

      Rose crawled her way over to join them, face desperate. “Sergeant, we can’t send Hope but let me try it. Please. I can make it.”

      Eldest had to turn away from the naked emotion on Rose’s face. “No. Rose, I know she’s your sister, I know she’s your only sister, but no. Even if you made it to the horses there’s no way you’d make it back. You’d be running into repeating rifles firing from steady rest behind a wall. It’s suicide. You’d be killed and how would that help Peony? We have to wait.”

      “Sergeant, I’m dead already. My womb’s dried up, I’m only filling in time before the end. Peony’s my only hope for family, for more flower girls. Even if it’s only a one in a hundred chance, it’s a better chance than I have now!”

      “No. There’s no chance and you know it. If the Blackwoods come over that wall we’ll need every hand that can hold a gun and…”

      “Sergeant, let me go,” piped a small voice beside her.

      Eldest rounded on the speaker, furious. “No one is going…” she started to snarl, but the sight she beheld drew the wind right out of her sails. “Apple, what on earth did you do to your face?”     

      Apple was a sight to behold. She had warpainted her face with what looked like candle-black and tallow, odd swirls and glyphs hurriedly dabbed in place along her cheeks, neck and hands.

      “It’s a spell,” Apple told her earnestly. “Plainswoman magic. My mamma taught me. Arrow magic, but Mamma said it worked for bullets too.  I can make it, the bullets won’t be able to find me.”

      “Apple,” Eldest gritted her teeth. “There is no such thing as magic.”

      “That’s true for Queenslanders,” came the dismissive reply. “I’m a plainsgirl.”

      “There is no such thing as magic, and warpaint will not stop bullets!”

      “Not for you. That’s why it has to be me! I’m the only plainsgirl here! Covering fire!” she snapped.

Chapter Text

      Her women were too well trained. At the call to cover fire they raised and emptied their revolvers at the enemy, largely unaimed fire that nonetheless had the Blackwoods ducking instinctually as Apple bolted from their shelter, bounding gazelle-like down the hill as Eldest cursed in horror. “Second revolvers, fire!” she snapped, raising her own, placing a row of shots along the wall, sending rock shards into the faces of the women on the other side. She cursed at the ammo they were wasting, but Apple didn’t have much of a chance even with covering fire. Without it, she had none.

      “Shoot that one! Shoot her!” came the bellow from the other side of the wall and Eldest emptied her carbine towards the voice. Empty, she risked a desperate look as Apple careened downhill. In a way she had been right. She was so small the grasses hid her better than they would an adult, and Mothers she was fast! Even her hair blended with the golden prairie grass as she bounded away. But as Ranger fire slackened with emptied cylinders the Blackwood Henriettas barked again and again. Eldest could actually see the furrows the heavy lead slugs tore through the grass as Apple dodged from side to side… and then, abruptly, she vanished from sight with a yelp that reached all the way back to where they were. A fusillade of shots blanketed where she fell.

      They did not see her rise again.

      Heartsick, they reloaded and Eldest called for an ammo count. Meg wormed her way over. “That cost us a quarter of what we had left,” she reported, voice low. “Each woman has a full load, and five reloads for what she carries. We’ve got all the long guns reloaded, and plenty of ammo for them, for what that’s worth.”

      “At three to five minutes a reload for the long guns, it’s not worth much. If we get out of this, I’ll be insisting on breechloaders like the Henriettas, and damn what the women in Supply think.”

      It was a long and heavy thought between them, that ‘if’.

      “Do you think there’s any chance Apple made it?” Meg asked at last, hesitant but grasping for hope.

      Eldest shook her head, an iron hollow in her heart. “We saw her fall. But even if she did, there’s no way back. We can’t lay down fire like that again if we want to live until nightfall. If I’d known she was going to try that stunt I’d have told her to ride for help. Hopefully, if by some miracle she made it, she’ll realize that and head out on her own."

      It was Meg’s turn to shake her head. “She risked it to save Peony. If she made it to the horses, she’ll be coming back with Hope’s kit in her hand.”

      “Gods I hope not. Mothers grant that she has more sense than that. It was suicidal enough running away from the bullets. Coming back, she’d be running into them.”

      “That’s tru…” Meg began but then broke off to cock her head, listening. “What’s that?”

      Eldest paused and listened herself, a steady drumming growing to a rolling thunder of hooves, felt through the ground. She turned around, half-expecting to see mounted Blackwoods on a charge, but the sight she beheld was even more bizarre. A herd of riderless horses thundered up the hill in a wide, sweeping arc, heading right for them. For a moment she wondered what wild horses were doing in a forest, then her brain lurched to the fact that these horses were saddled though they carried no riders. From there it was only a moment’s realization that those were *their* horses. All of them. Her own Sultana in the lead.

      Not only was she flabbergasted, the Blackwoods were too, their guns silent, staring. For a bare moment her mind conjured thoughts of vengeful ghost riders, and then…

…And then any doubts she’d had that Apple was truly plains born and bred vanished. She was clinging to Sultana’s side like one of the great plains raiders of yore, held by saddle straps and loops hastily braided into Sultana’s mane, using the mare’s bulk to shield herself from the Blackwood guns, and every astonished moment brought the charging herd closer to the Ranger’s wall.

      “Shoot them! Shoot them!” Marge cursed at her women, and ragged fire broke out.

      “Which ones?” came a plaintive yell from above them.

      “All of them! Any of them! Shoot, you stupid bitch!”

      Eldest had a heartbeat to make a decision. “Covering fire!” she snapped to her women.

      Her troop pounced on the command. A ragged volley broke out as hands lifted revolvers clear of the wall and unloaded lead at the Blackwoods. The angle of their fire was still lousy, but the purpose of covering fire was to keep heads down, not kill. It didn’t keep the Blackwoods down long, just a few precious moments. Horses screamed as the lead slugs tore into them. Not all of their wounds would be fatal of course, rare was the cavalry mount that didn’t carry a bullet or three from past battles, but it wasn’t the horse’s fight and they began peeling away, exposing Sultana and her precious cargo.

      “Shoot the bay! Shoot the bay!” Marge cursed.

      Multiple shots slammed into Sultana and she staggered, Apple somehow still keeping her under control as they raced to the wall. For a bare moment Eldest thought they might make it, then a lucky shot found Sultana’s faithful heart and she fell, the snap of her neck as she went down sickeningly clear. But somehow Apple leapt clear at the last moment, momentum making her an impossible target, a cartwheel of arms, legs, saddlebags and golden hair, to fetch up against the wall with a horrid thud.

      Eldest crawled over to her quickly enough to be rewarded with a moan as she dug herself out of the pile of saddlebags. Eldest helped excavate her, heart in her throat, feeling about for wounds. “Apple, are you all right?!”

   “Donchu worry about me, I’s right as rain,” she protested, hurriedly pushing away Eldest’s searching hands. Sitting up, she fished among the tangled pile of saddlebags, coming up with Hope’s hunter-green surgeon’s kit, face beaming with pride.

      “You’re a wonder,” Eldest grinned, passing it down the line to Hope’s squeal of delight.

      Still smiling, Eldest turned back to her drummer girl. She was scratched, bruised, battered and obviously sore, but she was already passing more saddlebags, one after another. She must have gathered the entire troop’s extra ammo into a few bags.

      “How are you not dead?”

      Apple managed a grin herself, if a pained one. “See Sergeant? Arrow magic is powerful stuff. If the bullets cain’t see you, they cain’t hit you.”

      Eldest shrugged helplessly, refusing to argue the absurd. Never tell the recipient of a miracle that magic doesn’t exist. “I guess they can’t, at least this time. You’ll have to teach me that trick someday.”

      Apple shook her head. “Naw, my mamma always said plainsmagic doesn’t work for Queenslanders because they don’t believe in it.”

      “It couldn’t have worked completely. We saw you fall!”

      “Oh that,” Apple waved the thought away. “I was runnin’ hell-fer-leather and all’s a sudden I ain’t got no ground beneath my feet. I think I fell in an old privy hole or summat. It weren’t too deep, but it startled me right proper it did!”

      “I’ll bet it did.”

      “ Ay-yup. Well, the Blackwoods plastered the place with lead, but I was in a hole. Those bullets couldn’t find me even if I didn’t have arrow magic. Once they got done wastin’ ammo I crawled out and shimmied skinny-like low in the grass all the way to the horses. They weren’t very far at that point,” she shrugged with a little wince.

      “Are you sure you’re all right?” asked Eldest, catching the wince.

      Apple nodded, flexing her arm and checking her torso. “Jus’ scratches… an… an I need to get my wind back. I’m plumb ashamed, usually I take my tumbles better than that.”

      “You were lucky you weren’t killed,” Eldest scolded, passing yet another heavy saddlebag of ammo down the line.

      The troopers eagerly passed the saddlebags along the line of the stone wall that sheltered them, the steely click of revolver hammers and the whirl of cylinders telling the tale of weapons reloading. Hope was already leaning over Peony, her kit open, threading something into the wound.

      Satisfied, Eldest glanced back to Apple, who seemed to have gotten most of her wind back, though the girl would have some spectacular bruises to go with the scratches. Apple noticed her gaze and broke down in tears.

      “I’m sorry,” she cried, “I’m so, so sorry. But Sultana was the herd mare. I knew the others would follow her. I had to take her; it had to be her.”

      Eldest shook her head and patted Apple comfortingly. “Don’t you even think about it, drummergirl. Much as it pains me to lose a horse, losing a trooper hurts a darned sight more. Sultana might have been mine, but with her sacrifice you’ve given the whole troop a chance at life. We can hold out until help arrives.”

      Hearing that, Meg crouched and crawled her way over to them, motioning Eldest aside. “Do you really think help will be coming?” she whispered, low.

      She owed her corporal the truth. “No,” she whispered back. “Or… not in time to do us any good.”

      “This gunfire has to be audible for miles.”

      “True, but we’re leagues inside the forest and the hills and trees will muffle the shots. Besides, when they do come searching, they’ll be searching in the wrong place. Our best hope is to wait until sunset, then slip away under cover of darkness.”

      “The darkness will hide us, but it’ll hide the Blackwoods as well and they know the land better. Can we take them, now that we’re reloaded?”

      “A frontal charge against that damned wall? No. Not against repeating rifles, not against as canny a woman as that bitch. They’ll be ready for that.”

      Though they’d started in whispers their voices had risen, something she realized as Apple cleared her throat, almost… embarrassed?

      “Sergeant?” She whispered, “I don’t know if these would help. But if they do… we’ve got them.” She handed over her own saddlebags, oddly heavy.

      Puzzled, Eldest yanked open the first, to reveal a handful of sleek, oblong shapes that looked like nothing so much as pregnant lawn darts. They were so out of place that it took her a few moments to identify them.

      “Grenades?” she hissed. “Ketchum grenades?!” She glanced to where her drummer girl crouched against the wall. “Apple Drover, how in Mother’s name do you come by a saddlebag of grenadier’s ordinance?!”

      Apple had the grace to look sheepish, if not exactly guilty. “They’s old stock. Supply was getting rid of ‘em. Sergeant Keva, she don’t care for ‘em, says they’s too unreliable on account of needin’ to land on they’s noses to go off proper. ’En the grenadiers don’t like ‘em on account of half of ‘em don’t land right and then the enemy can toss ‘em back atchya. So Major Kiverly, she says to get rid of ‘em.”

      “None of which explains what they’re doing in *your* saddlebags, drummergirl. Are you telling me you’ve been stealing surplus ordinance?”

      Apple looked shocked. “No, Sergeant! I ain’t no thief; I ain’t stolen nothin’ from nobody, ever!”

      “Were you issued them?”

      Apple looked down. “Well, no, not exactly.”

      “How do you figure you’re not a thief then?”

      “Well,” her drummer told her earnestly, “Major Kiverly is real specific about things like this. If it’s not in the inventory, it don’t exist. These got removed from the inventory, so rightly speaking, they don’t exist. You can’t steal somethin’ that don’t exist, Sergeant.”

      Not for the first time Eldest found herself staring opened-mouthed at her drummer girl’s logic. Finally she found her voice, if a plaintive one. “But Apple, *why* are you carrying around enough ordinance to outfit a detail of grenadiers?”

      “Oh,” came the offhand reply, “the other drummer girls and I take ‘em to the fifty foot cliff and chuck ‘em over the side.”

      “Again, why?”

      “’Cause it’s fun watchin’ stuff explode!” she enthused. “Sorta like Landing Day fireworks only better ‘cause you get to dodge the shrapnel spangin’ off the rocks!”

      Suddenly aware her mouth was still hanging open, Eldest closed it with a snap, then reached out to tousle Apple’s golden hair. “Apple, if we get out of this, I’m taking one of your stripes for being just plain foolish, but don’t worry, I’ll have to give it right back for being the heroine that brought us exactly what we needed to get out of this jam.”

      Apple thought on that and then gave her a wan little smile. “Well-all, I reckon I can live with that.”

      Eldest opened Apple’s other saddlebag. There were eleven grenades in all, two of the little one pounders, eight three pounders and one big fat five pounder, all sleek and deadly. Ketchem grenades *were* unreliable, needing to land just right and on hard ground to go off, but she didn’t need all of them to go off to shock the hell out of the women on the other side of that wall. Having them changed everything.

      “Girls, it’s Winterfair and Apple is Mamma Frost,” she whispered, passing them down the line. Eyes lit up at the sight of them, not questioning their good fortune. “Check your loads. On my signal, hurl them up and over, then charge when they go off.”

      “If they go off, grumbled Meg, hefting a three pounder beside her.

      Heart pounding, sick-scared feeling in the pit of her stomach, Eldest gave her corporal a wry grin. “Do you have any better ideas?”

      Meg shook her head, carefully placing a percussion cap into the plunger of the grenade. “Nope, not a one.”

      Eldest inserted a cap into her own five-pounder and nodded down the line at her other troopers doing the same. “Best heave, ladies. We have to get them over the upper wall. Chances are at least one of them will go off. We charge with that explosion. Remember these things make an unholy amount of smoke so *pick your targets carefully*. I don’t want us plugging each other.”

      Somber faces nodded, the women with the grenades ready to throw, the ones without bearing revolvers in each hand, cocked and ready.

      “…fucking queenslicking cunts we got a Blackwood husband for each and every one of you crib-loving whoremongers. You’re gonna wish your mothers had an abortion rather than you. Yer gonna die slow, just like my Jainy died slow and I’m gonna be smiling the whole fucking time…”

      She couldn’t help herself. Doctrine was never announce your intentions. A Ranger was there to kill her enemies, not talk to them. But she couldn’t help it. “Shut *up* bitch!” she snarled, then nodded savagely to her women. Fawn, May and Emma raised revolvers over the top of the wall and emptied them, an unaimed fusillade to get the Blackwoods ducking behind their own wall. A heartbeat later as shots still rang out Eldest snarled “Now!” and stood, throwing her grenade high and far, an arcing parabola as the Ketchem’s cardboard fins caught the air, lawn-dart like, guiding it to a nose-down landing. A few of her troopers had thrown from behind the safety of the wall, but most had dared what she had, standing, risking their lives for a better throw.

      “Down!” she yelled, hugging dirt as the oblong shapes fell.

      Then all hell broke loose.

      At least six grenades went off almost simultaneously, a deafening cascade of thunder ending in a massive concussion that could only be her own five pounder going off. Dirt rained down and thick choking smoke billowed upwards, uphill from them.

      “Go, Go!” she yelled, vaulting their own wall and sprinting across the twenty or so yards to the higher Blackwood wall. Once there the wall itself was some four feet high, too high to hurdle, but low enough to get a leg over and roll to the other side into a cloud of billowing, acrid powder smoke.

      Rolling, pistol ready, her eyes darted for targets as the smoke started to clear, revealing a hellish landscape of blood, twisted bodies and moaning wounded. Some women were rising, though, and shots rang out, both the softer bark of the Ranger’s Westins, and the sharper cracks of the Blackwood Henriettas. Suddenly a tall figure strode out of the smoke like a demoness out of a hellfire sermon, pistol in one hand, sword in the other, bellowing “Cut them queensbitches down, gang!”

      A very familiar voice. Eldest’s finger tightened spasmodically on the trigger and she emptied her revolver full into the other woman.

      That should have been the end of it. With any other woman it surely would have been. But Marge Blackwood was not an ordinary woman. She staggered and dropped the pistol, but she did not fall. Cursing, she turned on Eldest charging with sword upraised.

      Astonished, Eldest dropped her empty pistol, barely drawing her own saber in time to parry. Marge drove her back with maniacal stokes she felt all the way up her arm and into her shoulder. Eldest was never the swordswoman others in her troop were, Whisper especially, but this wasn’t swordwomanship, this was butchery, pure and simple. Two women hacking at each other with every ounce of strength they possessed.

      Marge attacked like a madwoman, using her superior height and weight to bull Eldest backward toward the wall. A vicious cut barely parried drove her to her knees, desperately throwing her sword up to protect herself. Marge struck like a thunderbolt and Eldest’s stamped, army-issue blade snapped at the hilt, leaving her defenseless.

      A simple thrust would have ended her right then and there, but Marge was too cruel a woman for such efficiencies. With a demonic, rictus grin she slowly drew back her sword for the final stroke, savoring her victim’s terror.

      That moment of viciousness cost her everything.

      “No!” Fawn hurled herself between them, striking out with her own blade, a delicate but lucky cut along Marge’s neck. Blood spurting between her fingers it was Marge’s turn to stagger back as Fawn and others of the troop hurled themselves at her, stabbing and cutting like picadors around a great wounded bull. Finally she went down, never to rise again.

Chapter Text

      With Marge’s death a lull settled over the battlefield. They looked around in shock, slowly realizing that the only women left had either asked for mercy… or hadn’t needed any. Exhausted but mechanically reloading her pistol, Eldest surveyed her troop, suddenly going cold as her count went one short. “Where’s Emma?” she demanded.

      Frantically they looked around, calling Emma’s name until Apple’s voice sounded desperately on the other side of the wall.

      “Sergeant, she’s here!”

      Exhaustion banished by adrenaline, Eldest snapped to Meg, “Clean up here, I’ll be right back!” then vaulted the wall.

      She found Apple and Emma in the no-women’s-land between the two walls, Apple cradling Emma in her lap, holding bloodied bandages to her chest, tears streaming down her face.

      “Apple!” Eldest ran to her, kneeling and applying pressure to the soaked bandages. “How is she? Did you call Hope?”

      Apple nodded, still crying. “I called her, she came. She… She said she had to go save the one she could save.”

      Eldest’s heart fell as she looked, really looked, at Emma. Her eyes were closed, a thin line of blood at the corner of her mouth, her skin already settling into the waxy grey pallor of death. Her chest where Eldest held the bandages neither rose nor fell.

      “She’s alive,” Apple insisted. “She spoke to me.”

      Eldest moved mechanically, setting the bandages aside to get a better look at the wound. Emma had been hit almost dead center between her breasts. A woman did not survive such a wound, not for long.

      “Emma is gone, Apple,” she said gently, then more firmly as Apple started to shake her head. “She’s gone. You did everything you could, and I’m glad she didn’t die alone, but your duty is to the living now. We’ll mourn Emma later. Is that Fillybranch rifle of yours still loaded?”

      Apple nodded affirmatively and Eldest went on. “Good. Dry those tears, girls don’t cry. You get your rifle and stand guard over Hope and Peony. We don’t know how many Blackwoods there are in these woods. You see any woman you don’t recognize, anyone not in an army uniform, you shoot them, clear?”

      Apple sniffled, then nodded, wiping her tears and a thin smear of blood at the corner of her mouth away with a sleeve. “Yes, Sergeant.”

      “Good girl. Go stand guard, that’s an order. The rest of us will be back soon.”

      After a quick check on Hope and Peony, Eldest heaved herself over the upper wall once more, pistol still in hand. Meg had the troop organized by detail, searching the top of the hill. A few of her women were wearing fresh bandages, but nothing that looked too serious. She strode up to Meg.

      “Corporal, report.”

      Meg braced. “No further resistance. No serious injuries, though Herra will have a nice scar to boast to the whores about. Sixteen enemy dead, two prisoners; though one won’t be a prisoner for long. How’s Emma?” she asked, her voice braced for the worst.

      “We lost Emma,” Eldest told her softly. “We still have hope for Peony.”

      “Damn. Damn!”

      “Damn is right. She took a round to the chest, halfway between the two walls.”

      Meg scowled. “That would have been Marge herself, I wager. None of these other gutless whores would have the tits to pull off something like that, firing under a grenade concussion.”

      “Lady Scratch has a new servant in hell,” Eldest agreed grimly.

      “It took five bullets and twenty sword cuts to put her down. Becca counted.” 

      “I missed with a round? Damn. I must be getting old.” She glanced off to a stone ruin halfway up the hill. “What’s that noise?”

      “One of the prisoners took one to the gut. She’s a little loud.”

      “Ah, yes,” drawled Eldest grimly. “We have prisoners?”

      Something in the tone of her voice must have alarmed Meg. “Uh, Sergeant, Command may want them alive…”

      “What?” she scowled irritably, then realized she still clutched her pistol in hand. “Oh, no, that’s not what I meant,” she explained as she holstered the pistol. “I’ll want to check on the troop. Grab whoever’s healthiest and search the ruins, make sure there’s no surprises there.”

      “Rose and Herra are already up there with their details, and Bea is leading yours. They volunteered.”

      “Good women. I’ll start with them.”

      She ascended the hill to where her women were searching through the ruins, looking for loot and making sure there were no additional Blackwoods hiding there. Rose looked at her with hope and dread, all wrapped up in anguish.

      “Peony is still with us,” Eldest reassured her. “Take your detail, get down to the lower wall. Make sure you announce yourselves; Apple’s standing guard and she’s been ordered to shoot anyone she doesn’t recognize. She’s likely to be a bit trigger-happy.”

      Rose almost wilted in relief. “Yes, Sergeant: thank you, Sergeant.”

      “Check with Hope; see if Peony can be moved. If she can, get them both up here. Gently, but get them up here. I don’t like us spread out like this. We don’t know how many Blackwoods are still loose in these woods.”

      “Yes, Sergeant.”

      Eldest considered, judging the sun. “One more thing; after she’s been relieved, I want Apple to see if she can round up any of those horses she scattered, or as many as she can find in short order. Then she’s to get them back here as quickly as she can.”

      “I’ll make sure she knows that, Sergeant.”

      Rose was herding her detail downhill as Eldest went to check on the rest of her women. Herra’s wound was the worst of the lot, a deep stab from a coffin-knife but the wound itself seemed clean and the bleeding had stopped. They’d washed it out with whiskey and Becca had done a fair job of stitching it. She’d seen women survive worse, as long as the rot didn’t take hold. Crossing her fingers, she checked in with the rest of her women. All of them nursed a wound of one sort or another and of course two of her women were dead. She might yet lose a third. It was difficult not to be bitter but the plain fact was that she and her troop had been extraordinarily lucky. If their situations had been reversed Eldest would have expected the Blackwoods to have taken well over fifty percent casualties, even if they’d had grenades. If Marge had had actual, military-trained women, rather than gutless river trash… The thought trailed off and she shuddered.

Chapter Text

      After Herra, Catherine was next worse, with a nasty bruise and a couple of cracked ribs. The bullet that had struck her would surely have killed her, but it hit a gold crown in her jacket pocket and the soft gold had folded around the bullet, lessening the impact. That hadn’t helped her ribs, but it had kept the bullet out of her vitals. Eldest fingered the bent coin, marveling. “You ought to have this one engraved as a good luck piece. Your life preserver.”

      “I will,” Cat promised, wincing. “That’s another life gone though. I only have seven left.”

      “A cat has nine lives. A Ranger has at least ten. Eight more should see you to retirement.”

      Cat gave her a wry grin. “Well, that depends. Just how many more insane charges are you planning on ordering this year?”

      Eldest had to blush at that. “It is becoming a bad habit, isn’t it? But I think I’m done, for now. If this…” She gestured expansively to the outlaw hideout they’d captured. “If this isn’t enough to buy us some downtime and R&R, I don’t know what will.”

      Her rounds finished with an unpleasant stop to check on their prisoners and the women who guarded them. The ‘ruins’ indicated on the logger’s map were just that, the ruined shell of what had once been some country manor. At some point in the past it had burned, the roof collapsing into the stone shell of the walls. Blackened windows and empty archways stood in mute testimony of both happier times and of the sickness that had ended them. The stone walls were still sound though, and the Blackwoods had re-roofed what had probably been a carriage barn for shelter. It was there that May and Sarah stood guard over their prisoners, each bearing a captured Henrietta in the crook of an arm. Approaching, it was almost as if Marge had never died. Another woman was launching an obscenity-laced tirade at them.

      “Why aren’t you bitches doing anything for me?” the woman screamed between gasps and sobs.

      As she came up Eldest glanced over the woman’s injuries. Someone had tried to bandage her stomach but Eldest had seen prettier scraps in a slaughterhouse. Something, maybe a grenade fragment, maybe a tumbling bullet, had churned the woman’s belly into a horror show. Her face was white and sweating, twisted in pain.

      “Why aren’t you doing anything for me?” she screamed again, weeping. “Get me a doctor, bitch!”

      “As if we bring doctors on patrol,” Sarah told her coldly.

      “Fuck you, fuck the Queens and fuck you too, Marge!” she spat. “We had everything –everything- and she threw it all away! Damn hats give her some guns and she dreams of being a queen! I hate you! You ruined me, you killed me, you stupid bitch!”

      Eldest turned away from the raving, dying woman as May came close. “Can we do anything for her?” she asked quietly.

      “No. Even if we pulled Hope away from Peony there’s nothing she could do with a wound like that and I’m not going to endanger Peony even a moment to treat someone who’s gallows meat anyways. But,” she conceded grudgingly, “Go to Hope, see if we can spare any laudanum. Nothing she might need for our own women, mind you, but if we have extra you can administer that. She eyed the woman, still raving. “Make it a large dose”.

      She turned away again, this time setting her steps to find Bea and see how the search was getting on. She found her going through the ruins with Catherine, Herra, Whisper and Fawn, captured rifles ready.

“Bea!” she called “Find anything?”

      “Meg said she counted sixteen enemy dead, two wounded prisoners… but we’ve counted twenty cots so far,” Bea reported worriedly. “We’ve at least two women unaccounted for.”

      “Lieutenant Tai reported they killed two when they were ambushed, so this may be all of them. Stay alert, though, they may have recruited more since then.” She eyed the rifle Bea carried. “Any chance I can get one of those pretties for myself?

      “Sure,” Bea reported with a note of disgust. “Come see this.”

      Bea led her to another section of the ruined manor, what had probably been a root cellar. “This appears to have been their armory.”

      Bea pulled aside a crudely-made door to reveal a dry, cool, closet-like space. Stacked therein were five long boxes, the pine unweathered, still bearing the maker’s mark of the Henrietta Repeating Arms company. Along with the longer boxes were a few shorter, square ones and a plethora of smaller rectangular ones that had the unmistakable size and shape of ammunition boxes. Three of the long boxes were unopened, one was empty, set to one side and the last was opened, revealing a dozen sleek, polished, brand-new Henrietta 44’s neatly packed, muzzle to buttstock, the cloying scent of factory packing grease redolent in the confined space.

      Now she understood Bea’s earlier disgust. Factory new rifles, still in their original packing crates.

      “Even the Queen’s Army doesn’t have this many,” Bea complained.

      “For all we know, these were made for the Queen’s army. The Henrietta Repeating Arms company is going to have some very awkward questions to answer.”

      Eldest selected a rifle at random, wiping down the grease with a rag and loading the tubular magazine. The first round chambered with a satisfying click.

      “Not a bad bit of war plunder at that. I don’t suppose you’ve found any other goods we might lay claim to?”

      Bea gave her a wry grin. “Well, the Lost Emerald Seal of the False Eldest hasn’t turned up yet, but yes. We found their treasure room. Most of it looks like stuff from Lawrence that’ll have to be returned to its owners but we might get some prize money out of it before all’s said and done.”

      “I’ll want to see that later, but let’s finish your recon, here.”

      They went back to where the others waited, then finished the sweep of the remaining ruins. The places the Blackwoods used were fairly obvious and so it was puzzling to find a great number of tracks and disturbed earth along one cellar wall with no obvious reason why.

      “Do you think this was the pantry, perhaps?” asked Bea.

      Eldest considered, stepping around the tracks. “If so, where’s the food? There’s not even shelving here. If they wanted a pantry they’d have used a root cellar.”

      “A latrine, maybe?”

      “If so, where’s the hole?” she sniffed. “Or the smell?” She stepped back; they were in what would have been the cellar of the manor though it was open to the sky now. The floors and roof above had burned and collapsed into the charred debris around them. So many tracks going nowhere… so why were they here?

      “We’ve seen this before,” she realized.

      “Sergeant?”

      “We’ve seen this before. At the river.” She began searching the wall of the cellar, fingers questing the finely dressed stone.

      Bea joined her, still confused. “What are we looking for?”

      “This manor was a noble’s residence. It had to have been. Nobles have to deal with the threat of war, rebellion, and assassination. If worst comes to worst, they want a way to get their menfolk and little ones to safety.”

      “That’s a two quince dreadful you’re talking about, not real life,” Bea began just as Eldest’s searching fingers found an innocuous stone that pushed inward with a faint click.

       Abruptly, a whole section of the wall swung inwards on silent hinges, revealing a dark, earthy-smelling passageway beyond.

      “No way,” Bea breathed, looking down the passageway.

      “Want to bet where it goes?”

      “The river’s a mile away or more!”

      “You’ll take the bet, then?”

      Bea peered down the dark passage. “Not today. Not with you, that’s for sure.”

      Eldest pulled the door closed, the lock setting with a soft click. Even knowing precisely where it was she couldn’t tell a door was there. The craftswomanship was that good.

      “Sergeant?” came Meg’s voice from above them.

      “Here, Meg.”

      “Apple’s back, with horses in tow.”

Chapter Text

      Apple had managed to find eleven out of the seventeen. Sultana, Chieftess and Bluejay were dead. Billie, Whiskey and Jill were still missing.

      “Is Jasper still sound?”

      Apple flinched guiltily at the question. “Yes. He’s too smart to hang around when the shootin’ starts. He was practically the first one to peel off. There ain’t a scratch on him.”

      Eldest considered. Apple had already proved her worth as a messenger, but she wasn’t a full-fledged Ranger yet and the trackless forest could fool even an experienced woodswoman. “Good. What about Clementine?” Clementine was Sarah’s horse.

      Apple shook her head. “She took a round in her hindquarters. I tweezered it out an dressed it with salve, but she ain’t sound fer ridin’”

      “Piss. What about Nightfall?”

      “Not a scratch on her.”

      “Good. Fawn!” she called.

      Fawn drifted in, captured Henrietta in one hand. “Here, Sergeant!”

      “Excellent. Apple, Fawn, you’re couriers. According to the map, we aren’t more than a dozen miles from camp. If the map’s correct, there’s also a logging road a mile or two west of here. You’re to ride back to camp as quickly as possible. Report to the Colonel herself. We need a full infantry column for backup, and Peony needs a surgeon, ambulance and stretcher team. You have three, maybe four hours of daylight left. Can you make it?

      They both seemed a bit dismayed, but Apple set her jaw stubbornly. “If that there road is where the map says it is, we’ll be pullin’ into camp inside o’ an hour, you can count on it. I’ll go fetch the horses.”

      Apple departed at a lope but Fawn remained, hurt and angry. “I’m a courier? Again? I thought I’d… I thought maybe now I’d proved…”

      Ah Fawn. Always trying to live down -or outgrow- her delicate name and figure. Eldest laid a hand on her shoulder. “Fawn. You proved yourself to me a long time ago. That’s why I turn to you when I need someone I can rely on. You’re a blooded Ranger now, and no one can deny that. Hell, you’re the woman who hung a red smile on Marge Blackwood! That’s going to stick, I promise you. But don’t let it make you all hard and cold. Remember we women bring life into the world, as well as take it out. Peony needs more help than we can give her, and Apple may be one hell of a drummergirl, but she’s still just a child. You’re in command. You go get help, and you get it as quick as you can!”

      Fawn swelled and stood taller with the praise. “Yes sergeant!” she snapped as Apple came up, leading Jasper and Nightfall, trailing Butterscotch and Cinnamon as remounts.

      “Good work, Apple,” Fawn told her as she swung up her own mount. “Let’s go get the rest of the 22nd. Don’t make me leave you behind!”

      Eldest watched them go at a quick trot, turning back to the ruins and the rest of her women. She’d spotted some shovels during the search, and with little to do now but wait, there was a sad duty that awaited them.

Chapter Text

      They buried Emma and Diana at the foot of the hill, not far from where Apple had tethered the horses, two fresh graves in a little glade set off from the main meadow, bounded by stone walls on four sides. A pretty spot, for what that was worth, better than the lot of most troopers, which was a lonely grave by the side of a road, soon overgrown and forgotten. They were far from the first women Eldest had lost, but the rituals never lost their poignancy. Looking back as they ascended the hill once more, Eldest wondered if she might prevail upon the princess to have proper gravestones made and installed. Emma and Diana had been fine women, taken too soon. They deserved to be remembered, even if only by the occasional passer-by, wondering at a set of stones in the wood.

      The Blackwood’s camp had held a last few surprises. One was the trade-office safe from Lawrence, still unopened. Whisper had thought it was something the Blackwoods were using as an anvil, set on end and scarred from hammers, sledges and chisels. It wasn’t until she’d noticed the hinges that she realized what it was. Perhaps the Chandlers wouldn’t have to sell their Papa after all, though that in itself would be a small tragedy. There were too many lonely women in the world to waste a breeding male on sentiment. Perhaps they could find an understanding nearby family to buy him, and let the little ones of his former family visit.

      Their other discovery was more heart wrenching. In a little room off the back of the Blackwood’s main sleeping area they found an abused little girl, no more than twelve, naked and chained to the wall. Apparently she was some woods-tramp’s daughter the Blackwoods had kidnapped to “play the boy” for them. The poor thing had literally tried to burrow through the stone to get away from them when Becca found her, and even now she was too traumatized to tell them much more than her name, which was Clair. They’d covered her in an Army blanket and soothed her as best they could, though in truth the only medicine they had was a little laudanum and the news that the ‘bad women’ were dead.

      Not much longer after that, the sound of hooves heralded the arrival of help at last. The Colonel looked magnificent astride her glossy black Imomain mount, a troop of cavalry with her, Fawn and a worn-looking Apple trailing behind.

      “Did you bring an ambulance?” Eldest asked anxiously, looking for any others.

      “No, the road’s too rough,” the Colonel explained. “Even if your trooper survived, the wagon never would. But the whole camp turned out on the news; we have relays of stretcher-bearers waiting, all the way back to camp, and a doctor with us. We’ll get your Peony back, light as a feather and swifter than any wagon, I promise you that.”

      “Thank you, thank you,” Eldest breathed. “I’ve lost too many women today as it is.”

      Her pain echoed in the Colonel’s features. “Everything that can be done, will be done, that I promise you.” She gestured and the doctor, a grey-haired woman with a finely-lined face and kindly features, rode up, wearing the ancient red crosses of a medician on her uniform. “This is Doctor Natallen.”

      “Fawn, Apple,” Eldest addressed them. “Hope and Peony are up by the ruins. Escort Doctor Natallen there. Make sure she has everything she needs.”

      The Colonel watched them go as more troops of cavalry arrived, dismounting and spreading out to take positions to guard what the Rangers had won. “Now that we have a moment, perhaps you can show me just how you managed this miracle.”

      Eldest waved away the praise. “The same way as always, by stupidly blundering my way into it like some doe-eyed tenderfoot at a roundup.”

      They toured the hill together, starting at the lower wall and finishing up at the upper one, where her women had laid out the dead Blackwoods. The Colonel scowled as she nudged Marge Blackwood’s body with the toe of her boot as Eldest finished her narration.

      “So, that’s basically it. We trailed a large group of women to the general area, lost the trail, then like an ass I led my women straight into the hornet’s nest. Of course the Blackwoods would pick this site as a camp, for exactly the same reasons as I did, and I didn’t realize that until it was too late. If hadn’t have been for Apple and few pilfered grenades…” She looked over to the Colonel. “Will there be trouble over that? Pilfering arms is no light matter.”

      The Colonel snorted. “I’ll speak to Major Kiverly about it but I assure you, no one pilfers anything from her she doesn’t want pilfered. She probably pointed them out to Apple herself, and sees the drummergirls as her ordinance disposal team.”

      “I’ll be speaking to her myself, if that’s the case,” Eldest returned sharply. “But as for the rest,” she gestured at the row of bodies, “just dumb luck.”

      “I don’t see it that way. Neither will the princess. Now let’s get your trooper, and your women, home. You’ve done your job. And,” she grinned, “the princess had called for a revel, to celebrate. The whole camp is waiting on you to start.”

Chapter Text

      As the Colonel promised, there were fresh stretcher bearers every half mile, all the way back to camp, each set of women determined to close the distance quicker and gentler than the one before. Peony was whisked along as if on a magic carpet until she was brought safely to the hospital tent at camp, an anxious Rose at her side. Eldest conferred with the doctor and the news was mostly good; the wound itself was clean, the bleeding had stopped, and with her chest drained both her lungs were working again. Her chances were good, the doctor promised- as long as the rot didn’t take hold. 

      With a silent prayer to Hera, Eldest exited the tent into the last of the failing light. The camp was extravagantly lit with lanterns, and troopers worked with a will, setting up dancing squares and barrels of rum and even a few of whiskey for the coming revel. Smiles and thumbs-ups greeted her as she made her way to the little knot of tents that marked their encampment. The girls were already casting speculative eyes on passers-by. By longstanding Army tradition, any trooper inside your regiment was off-limits, regimental incest. But by equally ancient tradition those limits were relaxed on a revel night, when anyone outside your own company was fair game. Then there were the Marines, who were in a separate command entirely and thus unquestionably safe. This should be a night to remember… but first things first.

      She conferred with Meg as they settled on arrangements for a wake for Emma and Diana. First she made damn sure the best barrel of whisky went to the site, along with any delicacies Cookie was willing to part with. Then she sent notes to Captain Hawthorne and the out-of-troop friends of the two, such as she knew them. Another note went to the priestess/chaplain, and of course... She looked around, frowning. “Where’s Apple?”

      Bea looked up from a last-minute chore with a cock of her head. “I think she went off to her tent, Sergeant.”

      Perhaps not surprising, but she bent her steps to Apple’s little half-sized wedge tent, the door flaps already tied shut for the night.

      “Apple, aren’t you coming to the revels?” she called to the girl within.

      It was a tired voice that drifted out from the tent. “Aww, I’m plumb tuckered out and from all I hear, a revel’s jus’ an excuse to git likkered up and find a likely girl to trade carpets with; an’ my mamma’d tan my backside fer even thinkin’ about either one at my tender years. I reckon y’all kin tell me all about it in the mornin’.”

      “Oh, but… we’re starting with a wake for Emma and Diana. We were counting on you for taps, but… I’ll go see if one of the other drummergirls can fill in.”

      The tent abruptly stirred, and Apple’s golden head poked out from the door flaps. “Don’t you dare. I’ll be done hanged fer a horse thief a’fore anyone but me sounds the call for one of ours. Lemme git my jacket.” 

      “Good girl.”

      They only had to wait a few minutes before Apple joined them, shiny brass bugle in hand. They were just forming up for the march to the wake when Blackberry strode up.

      “Sergeant, the Colonel sends her regards; she apologizes, but the princess has asked for a preliminary report, just as soon as you’re able.”

      Eldest scowled, looking over her women, their faces glowing in the flickering torchlight. The sounds of revelry were already beginning, and her women deserved every moment of it. Yet one didn’t say no to a princess. “You girls go,” she wished them. “Save me a seat for me, I’ll be along as soon as I can.”

Chapter Text

      Whisper sat towards the back of the fire circle, watching and listening as troopers rose each in turn to share a memory of their fallen comrades.  A wake was a time to celebrate the departed and the lives they had lived, even as a funeral was a time to mourn them. That was how things should be, but as she nursed her measure of whiskey the melancholy of the moment overtook her, even as friends and comrades stood to share thoughts and memories. She ought to be honoring the lives of her comrades, and yet her thoughts kept turning back to her own.

      It had all seemed so simple, those decades ago. She'd be a brigadier general at the age of twenty-four, just like the great General Klem. Attract the notice of the Queens with her valor, retire to a land grant, buy or steal a husband and found a family to last a thousand years, with children and grandchildren to comfort her in her old age. And now? Looking at the tail end of her life, she saw that everything would grow smaller and less significant, until she went down to dusty death, along with everything she had ever known or loved. Now, it seemed, was a time for letting go of illusions, and allowing dreams to die, just as Emma and Diana had died. She knew she would end her life as a private or perhaps at most a sergeant of Queen's Rangers. There would be no glorious moment before the queens, no land grant, no husband, no daughters and granddaughters to dandle upon her knee.

      Oh, it might not have had to be so. If only she had not been so hotheaded in her youth, had not provoked the duel that took another woman's life and the better part of her own voice. If only that woman had not been related to a countess, and if only she had not been blacklisted from all rank and the Order of the Sword as a result. She never dreamed, so long ago, that her life would condense to 'if onlys'. Still, she told herself, she shouldn't complain. There were those, like Emma and Diana, who had paid a heavier price than she ever had. And if she didn't have daughters, still she had a family of sorts, the only family she would ever have.

      Thinking of them, she looked across the rows of benches around the fire, seeing little Apple asleep curled along a bench, her bugle still cradled loosely in her arms.

      Well, it had been a long day, after all. The little drummer girl of Shiloh had done all that anyone could have asked of her and more, right down the beautiful notes that mourned their fallen sisters. She'd get their good little Apple back to her tent, then toast the ghosts of dreams until she was too drunk to feel the pain of their passing.

      Kicking back the last of the whiskey, she rose and went to the sleeping girl and gathered her up in her arms, bugle and all. She was heavier than Whisper would have thought, limbs going gangly in long-delayed growth, and she was oddly cold. Colder than she should be. Frowning, she looked down at the girl's pale face and knew at once that something was wrong, even before her nose identified the scent of blood. Concerned, she set Apple down, her hands wet and sticky. Blood. The girl's right trouser leg was stiff with it. Heart pounding, she eased the trousers down, to find a crude, soaked bandage and more blood. And then…

      …Then she looked up sharply, to the left and right. All around her were the backs of various soldiers. No one was paying them the slightest attention. Easing Apple's trousers back up, she saw Meg sitting, nursing a drink and thoughts of her own. Rising with Apple in her arms, she went to Meg.

      "Come with me. Now," she demanded, her scratchy voice painful even in her own ears.

      One of the few advantages of rarely speaking was that people tended to pay close attention when you did. "What's the matter?" Meg asked, even as she rose and followed her as she carried Apple away from the fire, towards the empty mess tent.

      An astonished, fay sort of humor filled her. "Let's just say that I've discovered that even if you give up on your dreams, it doesn't mean your dreams have given up on you."

Chapter Text

      Eldest sat in the company tent, filling in the last details of her report to the Princess. Outside there were the sounds of drunken revelry in the camp, now that the Blackwood gang was run to earth and this dribble-drabble charnel-house game of hide and go seek was done.  Soon she’d join the revelers, and was looking forward to it. But first, to make sure the proper people got the proper credit due them. Every woman in the troop would certainly be inducted into the Order of the Sword, and Meg might even have a chance at Officer’s School. She’d get that damned black mark against Whisper removed, just see if she wouldn’t. The little family she’d nurtured might actually start to rise in the world, might earn a lifetime measured in years rather than in engagements and missions.

      Of course, she reflected sadly, that very success meant the end of this particular family. Promotions would be forthcoming, girls transferred, given their own patrols, their own troops. That was Army life, and these would be far from the first women she had lost to success. She’d likely keep her younger ones though: Sarah, May and Becca. And of course she’d be able to keep Apple another year, before she turned sixteen and Major Kiverly stole her away to a safe sinecure in Supply. The thought was heartbreaking, but the Army took with one hand and gave with the other. The lost ones would be replaced by fresh young faces, new adopted daughters to raise, train, love and bid farewell in their turn. Bittersweet, but that was the Army, the only life she knew.

      With a flourish, she signed the report, looking up as Meg and Whisper entered the tent, unannounced. Frowning at the breach in protocol, she drew her breath for a tongue-lashing, only to stifle it at the looks in their faces. Looking like they’d seen a ghost was not quite right. More like they had seen an elephant.

      “What’s wrong?” she asked sharply.

      Whisper looked to Meg, who hesitated. “Ah… It’s Apple, Sergeant. H… She fainted at the wake. Whisper and I carried her back to the mess tent, there’s blood all down her leg, it wasn’t just scratches. She took a round there at the hill.” 

      Eldest nodded, surprised, but not really. “I knew she was acting funny, should have ordered her to the medician’s tent, ‘just scratches’ be damned. I assume that’s where you took her? What did Doctor Natallen say?”

      Meg and Whisper looked at each other helplessly. “Ah, no, we bandaged h… her up, she’s in your tent at the moment, sleeping. Ah… You really ought to come see for yourself.”

      Eldest allowed a scowl to come to her face. “I’m not in a mood for riddles, Meg. What is the matter with Apple and why isn’t she in the medician’s tent now?"

      A stubborn set came over Meg’s face. “I really couldn’t say, Sergeant. Best you see for yourself.” 

      Still frowning, she opened her mouth to bellow an order, but checked the impulse. If Meg thought she should come see, then just maybe she ought to. Scowling, she shoved back from the desk. “There had better be a good explanation for this,” she warned as she followed them to the little wall tent that was her own.

      They’d laid Apple on her cot, covered by a rough military blanket, her bright mop of golden hair haloed on the pillow. Drummergirls’ hair was deliberately kept longer than the typical crop, partly so that one could tell that they *were* drummergirls, not short privates. Even so, Apple needed a trim. She looked almost angelic lying there, soft breath going in and out, a half-smile on her lips, but her cheeks were hollow and pale from blood loss. She turned to Whisper and Meg. “Very well, I've seen for myself. I see a good little Apple who’s not near as rosy as she should be. She ought to be with the medicians. What is all the fuss about?”

      Meg crossed to the sleeping girl as Whisper pulled the tent-flaps closed. “Ah… This, Sergeant,” she said, folding the blanket down to the unconscious child’s knees.

      For a moment Eldest didn’t understand what she was seeing, and then…

      …Then it was like being poleaxed by a very large, very soft but very heavy mallet. A hundred odd things, each individually dismissed or explained away suddenly clicked together. The narrow hips and strong shoulders. Her shyness around others while taking a piss. The breasts that wouldn’t bud. The odd strength that let her handle a rifle taller than she was. A jaw just a touch too linear, a face just a smidge too broad.

      Without thinking she knelt, first to softly touch the little cock and balls there, to assure herself what she saw was real. Then to inspect the boy’s bandaged thigh, tightly bound, the white cotton stained with blood but not too badly. More of a deep graze than anything else, it had still bled messily and Apple was simply too small to be able to tolerate much blood loss.

      "Our Apple…comes with a bit of a stem," Meg observed dryly, her voice filling the stillness of the tent.

      Eldest could only nod in shock. ‘A boy’, she thought numbly. Their little Apple was a boy. A beautiful, almost angelic boy. The realization thundered around her head as a frisson of genetic greed coursed through her; not simply because Apple was a boy, but for all the things a boy meant to a woman. A Husband. Fertility. Motherhood. Children. Family. Honor. Things line soldiers like themselves only dreamed of.

      “Who knows about this?” she found herself asking.

      Meg drew close. “Right now? You, me, and Whisper,” she said worriedly. “They… they won’t allow us to keep him, will they?”

      “No,” she answered automatically, strangely detached from the import of her words, her fingers tracing the faint whip scars on Apple’s torso, and the even more horrific brand on his shoulder. Gods, it was horrid enough the Bozes did that to a girl; that bitch Carol Boze did that to a *boy* not even old enough to marry! It was beyond improper. It was obscene. She took a deep breath, the implications of it all rocketing around her brain, before turning to face them.

      “Apple is a boy. He’s property. That means he has to belong to someone. If the court doesn’t return him to that bitch Carol Boze they’ll see him as Army war plunder and condemn him to an Order of the Sword Crib.”

      “Our good little Apple? Thrown in a crib to rot?” said Meg, aghast.

      “Apple’s been in an army camp for almost a year. No one will believe we weren’t all mounting him two and three a night. No mother will take the risk he wasn’t infected somehow. He’ll never be bought as a husband. That leaves the cribs."

      “Apple will never survive in the cribs. Hell, the first woman who mounts him will probably crush him!”

      “We already know he’s stronger than he looks and he’ll be getting bigger every day now; boys shoot up later than girls. But yes, a crib is no place for our little sweetie.”

      “Then what do we do?” asked Meg. “We can’t hide him forever, someone will cotton to him eventually. Hell, I’ve been feeling guilty these past few weeks for noticing what a lovely bottom he has, and that’s when I thought he was a girl!”

      “I know, I know. Dai even touched on it back on the Border, told me Apple had a better future as a whore than a soldier. But Whisper won’t talk, you and I won’t talk. That gives us a little time,” she sighed. “A very little time.” Thoughts awhirl, she rose and left the tent, Whisper and Meg following in her wake, striding to the fire-ring at the center of their little encampment, trying to draw her thoughts together, trying to think.

      The orange-red glow warmed their faces, banishing the cool fall air as she tried to understand the implications of it all. A hundred scenarios came to mind, and in each a fatal flaw, a hidden trap. What *were* they going to do? Now that she knew, there were a dozen or more clues that Apple wasn’t the girl he pretended to be. How soon would it be before someone else latched on to those signs, and the opportunity was snatched from them? Hell, in hindsight, it was obvious! Yet she could also understand how Apple had managed to remain undetected so long. He was small and delicately featured, even feminine in some ways. Combined with the androgyny of the young and the fact that few women in the Army had ever seen a man and it was easy to overlook what signs there were. If they were women with husbands or especially young brothers they surely would have twigged to his little charade a long time ago. But with the exception of few of the highest officers, there were no such women in the Army, and Apple had little contact with the upper officers except for the Colonel and Major Kiverly; and both those worthies were busy women, with little time to spare for lingering glances at a diminutive drummer-girl. That wouldn’t last, though. With proper nutrition, Apple was now rapidly maturing into a coltish beauty that women would literally kill for.

      Long minutes passed while Eldest sorted her thoughts, Meg and Whisper being mercifully quiet, letting her think, perhaps occupied with thoughts of their own. Legally, she supposed she ought to return the Boze’s property to them, or at least turn him over to Command, for them to decide what to do with him. She could not muster the least enthusiasm for either course of action. Shuddering, she recalled her last visit to the Order of the Sword cribs. They’d given her a new boy, acquired, she’d heard, through a foreclosure sale. Young and almost pretty, he hadn’t been violent, not like some of the others, so he wasn’t chained, but she still remembered his drugged, confused and frightened look as she’d guided him to the bed to mount him. His simple question of “why?” through the haze of the drugs still haunted her.

      The memory steeled her. She didn’t know what to do, but she sure as hell knew what not to do.

      “We keep him,” she said finally. “We keep him, and keep him safe. I don’t know where we go from here, but we start with small steps. Meg, you stay with him. If he wakes, try and get food and water in him, especially water.” Meg nodded and headed back to the tent as she turned to Whisper.

      “We don’t dare take him to the surgeon’s, so Whisper, you see if you can find Hope. If she’s not too drunk yet, get her back here. We’ll have to let her in on the secret, but then, we’ll have to let them all in eventually and Hope’s the closest thing to a medician we have.”

      Whisper nodded and turned to go but they were both brought up short by Meg dashing back, eyes wild. “He gone!”

      “Gone?!” repeated Eldest dumbly, striding back to the tent. “How could he be…” Her little wall tent had two sets of door-flaps, one at each end. The pair by her cot were normally laced shut, so much so that she sometimes forgot they were there. But now the lacing had been undone down low, wide enough to let Apple slip out.

      Meg turned to her, stricken. “How much do you think he overheard?” she asked, anxious. “If he woke partway through, if he heard us…”

      “…He’d be trying to run,” finished Eldest grimly. “Alone, naked, in a camp full of drunken women horny enough to rape a billy-goat.”

      How could she have been so stupid?

      “Not naked… his clothes are gone, we left them on the chest when we brought him in,” Meg told her. “But for the rest… you’re right. He could be anywhere by now. Where would he go?”

      Eldest wracked her brains. Where, where. Wounded, discovered, found out... Where in the vast collected encampment would Apple go? Where would she, no, HE, try to hide? Where would be safe? And then it clicked. There was no place safe. Apple would be trying to get as far away as he could, as fast as he could. He wouldn't get far on foot with that leg. But Apple had a talent with horses.

      "The horse lines." she said confidently. "That's where." She turned to Meg. "Get the troop together, I don't care how you do it but pry them away from whatever drink or whores they've found, assemble at our camp.”

      Meg departed at a run while she turned to Whisper. "Follow me. He can't be walking fast, if we run we can get to the lines first and wait."

Chapter Text

      The horses were picketed, as always, downwind from the camp. Their own were near the edge, almost in the forest, near the rise of a small hill. While Apple could go for any horse he was sure to want one used to him, and Ranger's mounts were much better than the average trooper's anyway. He would want one of theirs, and that meant Jasper.

      Breathing hard, they found their own line in the darkness, the lantern showing the beasts quieted for the night... one, two, three six... ten. Heart sinking, she saw Jasper wasn't among them. *How* had that little scamp made it here so fast? "He still can't have gone far in the dark," she told herself, told Whisper. "Whisper, we take two horses each. He has to be heading for the traderoad. I'll ride west, you stop at the camp, have whoever Meg's gathered start searching the camp just in case, then you ride south..."

      "Eldest", hissed Whisper, pointing to the rise of the hill. In the moonlight they could see the silhouette of a rangy horse and a little rider astride, beneath the spreading limbs of a massive oak. Apple. On Jasper. Praise the gods, still time.

      "Whisper, you go wide", she ordered. "Get behind him, quietly."

      Whisper nodded, her long rangy form blending into the darkness as Eldest doused the lantern and took up the hill at a run.

      "That's far enough," the clear light soprano voice called out as they drew close. The moon was bright, clear enough to see the tears streaming down Apple's face as he sat the horse, unnaturally stiffly under one long limb of the tree.  "Don't you come no closer, Eldest."

      Eldest fetched up. Jasper was ten times the trouble of any of their other horses but he was also the fastest and with only little Apple's weight, running them down would be difficult, probably impossible... even assuming Apple didn't pass out again from blood loss and dash his head against the cobble of the road. She had to get him off that horse. She reached for her sergeant’s voice, but checked the instinct. A shout, a lunge, and Jasper would surely bolt. She had to keep him calm and talking.

      "I guess you know, now," said Apple sadly, still straight in the saddle, looking down the road before him.

      Somehow another voice emerged from her throat. A voice she hadn’t heard since her own Mother had died, years before. But it came to her now, calm, soothing. "Apple, honey, yes. Yes we do. But you don't need to run. Everything will be just fine. You'll see."

      Fresh tears coursed down the pretty boy's face. "Everything is never fine, it only gets a little better just to show you how much worse it can get." He turned slightly to face her. "I won't go back to the Bozes. And I won't be a nameless number in a Sword crib."

      "You won't be," she promised recklessly, "We'll hide you. The whole troop. No one will know," she promised, though even in her own ears the words sounded hollow.

      "Eldest, you've never lied to me before, I'd take it as a kindness if you didn't start now. Word gets out. It always does. No secrets in a war-camp, right? You taught me that yourself. And even if some trooper don't turn me in for coin, my own chin'll betray me before too long. I already have to pluck peach whiskers, soon nothing'll hide it." He nodded down the road, silvery in the moonlight. "S'better this way."

      She tried logic. "Apple, even if you ride off where will you go? Everyone will be looking for you. You won't get far."

      "I wasn't planning to," said the boy quietly, still looking down the road. "An Apple never falls far from the tree, right?" he asked, his voice oddly light and self-mocking.

      For a moment his words made no sense. Then shock flowed through her veins like icewater. A thin black cord, almost invisible in the darkness, hung from the branch above him, tied in a tight noose around his pale, slender neck. She checked an urge to dash forward for the horse’s halter. One false move, one buck or bolt from that skittish horse and that pretty neck would snap like a reed in the frost, she had the clearest vision of it, all complete. A more perfect trap could not have been devised.

      She licked suddenly dry lips, trying to think of something, anything to say.  “Apple, sweetie, no. No, don’t you do this…”

      He turned to her a last time, sadly. “Just wanted you to know… The last year has been one of the happiest in my life. I’m glad to have met you and the 22nd. Thank you.” He looked ahead, raising his ankles as a scream began to form in her throat. “Apple, sweetie, NO!”

      His heels raked Jasper’s flanks and the horse shot out from under him. She saw it, saw the whole thing as she raced forward, knowing it would be too late. And even though she saw it all, she had no idea quite how Whisper managed it. From the other side, one long rangy arm swept Apple’s little form off the saddle as the horse shot forward, while the other flashed a saber over his golden head. The cord-noose jerked savagely, scoring his pale neck, but the sword parted it before it could finish its deadly work. Jasper thundered off down road while she and Whisper cradled the crying, sobbing boy between them.

      “No, no, no, let me go, let me die, please, just let me die…” the words and sobs wracked his frame as they held him, quieted him, the mother in her murmuring soothing promises that somehow, some way, it would be all right. He quieted, falling unconscious once more as she realized her hand where she held his leg was slick with blood. The wound had reopened.

      Stifling a curse she eased his trousers down, applying pressure and retying the soaked bandages. The flow slackened and stopped, as she hoisted him up in her arms, dangerously pale as she nodded to Whisper. “Back to camp. Jasper will be back for his morning grain, no sense chasing him now.”

      They made an odd little train, but the soldiers were in good spirits with the extra rations of rum and beer, snatches of drunken song carrying through the night, and no one challenged them. Their own camp was still empty; Meg hadn’t gotten the troop back together yet.

      She laid him back in her own tent, covering him with a blanket and listening to his breathing while Whisper fetched fresh bandages and changed the dressing on his wound. Being horizontal again woke him a little, and haltingly, half-conscious, he answered the questions she thought to ask as she gave him water from a canteen to help replace the fluids he’d lost. He’d just fallen back asleep when Meg parted the door flaps of the tent.

      “We finally found everyone,” she announced. “They’re all here except Peony; she’s still at the infirmary. I haven’t told them anything. They’re not happy.”

      “I imagine not,” she said dryly. “I’ll speak to them. You stay with Apple; he’s not to be left alone again. I’ll be sending the women in one at a time.” She breathed out a sigh. “You show them what you showed me.”

      “All of them? Meg asked, the question hanging between them.

      “All of them,” she confirmed. “Whatever we do, we have to do as a troop, or there’s no point.”

      Around their own fire, the troop was a morose and angry lot, pulled away from the revels. They were too disciplined to bitch openly, but she could see the grievances in their eyes. She came up and joined them, beginning without preamble. “I’ve pulled you away from your hard-won fun and you’re not happy about that. I think you know me well enough to know I wouldn’t do so without good reason. Something’s come up and we need to decide what to do about it. It involves Apple; I want each of you, in turn, to go into my tent. Meg will show you what you need to know. We’ll discuss it after everyone has seen… What you need to see.” She nodded to Nan, sending her in first. She wasn’t gone long, emerging shocked and stunned, sitting heavily on one of the benches around the fire, as if she didn’t trust her legs to support her. Wordlessly, she waved the next woman in and the looks around the fire went from resentful to curious… Then apprehensive as one by one they went, one by one they emerged, until Sarah, the youngest, emerged pale and shaken.

      Eldest looked around the fire, seeing in her trooper’s faces the same shock, elation and yes, greed she herself had. Like her they’d seen the elephant. Or the little rooster at any rate. She took a seat around the fire with them, clearing her throat, their eyes turning towards her. Speaking softly but her voice carrying to them all, she told them what Apple had shared with her.

      “Apple’s real name is Jonni Clem. His mother seems to have been an outcast or a singleton, she never told him and he didn’t know enough to ask. She visited a crib, probably the one in Sarah’s Bend, and ‘won the lottery’… her first and only was a boy. But whether out of love or foolishness she didn’t sell him to a broker. Instead, she raised him alone. Since she had no one else to help guard him and she wouldn’t have had a prayer of keeping him if it was known he was a boy, she raised him as a girl. Even his birth certificate says so. I guess that wasn’t too hard, while he was younger. He’s small and pretty enough to pass. Hell, he fooled us going on a year now! Besides that, they moved around enough most people didn’t get to look closely. As part of that movement, they did seasonal work with the Bozes, helping with the cattle drives. About halfway through the season, they called his mother up to the main house. Apple’s not sure what happened next. The Bozes showed up, told him his Ma had sold him as a husband. Maybe she tried to; he doesn’t think so, though. He never saw her again. Later they told him she’d been killed at a ferry crossing. The Bozes stuck him in their husband quarters and for a year or so that wasn’t too bad. All he to do was cook and clean for them. Dawn-to-dusk work but they left him alone, mostly. When he turned thirteen, though, they started molesting him. They said thirteen was good enough in the olden days, so it was good enough for him now. Sophonsiba Boze, in particular, would come to him drunk and she liked hurting him.”

      A low growl of anger passed through the troop, like distant thunder before the storm.

      “One day though, Sophonsiba let something slip while drunk. He doesn’t think they paid a Son’s Price to his mother. He thinks they killed her and buried her by the river willows. That’s when he started running away. They caught him quick the first two times, and whupped him for it. The third time he managed to stay free a week before they tracked him down. He was almost fourteen then. That’s probably when they realized they don’t have clear title to him. They don’t have a marriage contract, they don’t have a broker’s bill of sale, they don’t even have a valid birth certificate. The country’s not at war, so they can’t claim him as war plunder, and the husband raids were outlawed decades ago.” She took a deep breath. “So that’s when they branded him, to give themselves a claim if he got loose again.”

      Another growl of anger, deeper, touching veins of rage answered her words.

      “In order to claim him legally, they had to repair his birth certificate, claiming a simple clerk’s error. The upcountry county clerk is in their pocket, but for just that reason all retroactive alterations to sworn certificates are handled solely by the Keepers in Mayfair. And you have to bring the subject with you. They booked passage on a river packet and kept him close in their room; but one night, when they were asleep, he greased the rim of one of those little portholes with mayonnaise from a sandwich, pushed his clothes through, and managed to squirm out. He jumped from the boat and swam ashore. For a few months he lived wild with the river trash; Finns, Sawyers, families like that, still passing as a girl. Then,” she smiled wryly, “he decided to forage around our camp. He still swears the apple he found was abandoned on the ground, not in a barrel.”

      A chuckle passed through the troop.

      “After that, well, we know the rest of his story from there. He’s been our good little Apple ever since.” She took a deep breath, then continued on. “So now you know as much as I do. Now we have to decide –as a troop- what we will do about it.” She gazed around the fire, catching each of their eyes in turn. “Whatever we do, it has to be unanimous. Each of you has a veto.  All it takes is one woman whispering in the wrong ear, and everything comes crashing down.”

      For long moments no one spoke, then Sarah broke the silence, hesitantly. “Is it really this complicated? Apple is part of our Troop. Won’t he want to stay with us?”

      Eldest sighed. Sarah was a second generation line soldier and young. Apple was probably the first male she’d ever seen. It was no surprise she wasn’t familiar with the law. “Apple is a boy, Sarah”, she said gently. “Legally, he’s property, like a horse or a chair. The only question the court will care about is who he belongs to. And you can bet it won’t be a troop of low-ranking line soldiers like us.”

      “That’s why the Bozes branded him,” said Nan tightly, fury and realization in her voice. “They don’t have clear title to him. No one has clear title to him except his mother, and if Apple’s right, she’s dead. But there are laws on stray animals upcountry. You find a maverick calf on the range and put your brand on it, it’s yours.”

      “The court wouldn’t return him to his mother’s murderers!” snapped Becca. Then her voice turned plaintive. “Would they?”

      “Even Apple isn’t sure what happened to his mother,” Nan replied. “We have no proof other than Apple’s word that she was killed… and Apple’s a boy. Property can’t testify in court.” She looked bleak. “So yes, the court could very well return him to those murdering bitches.”

      “That’s not right,” snarled Bea. “That’s not right,” she appealed to all of them. “What about us? We found him, isn’t there some finders keepers law about menfolk?”

      Nan shook her head. “The problem is that we didn’t find him. He found us, sort of. If a stray horse wanders into your pasture, that doesn’t make it yours. If he’d been kidnapped, *then* we rescued him, yes, I think there’s a law that applies. But even then, we’re sworn to the Queens. Unless it’s wartime, we don’t get possession of him, the Queens do. Which is to say, the Army. As badly as men are needed in the Order of Sword cribs, they’d hand him over to a crib governess in a heartbeat. Our Apple, drugged and chained to a bed. As pretty as he is, he’d be very popular. Who wouldn’t want hair like that for her daughter? Maybe we’d even get to see him sometimes. If he wouldn’t spit on us,” she finished bleakly.

      A collective shudder passed around the fire, contemplating that. Finally Rose spoke. “So what do we do? Desert?” she held up the back of the hand, showing the Order of the Sword tattoo there, six generations of crib fathers initialed around the sword. “Peony and I, we’re sixth generation line soldiers. Leaving aside we’re both loyal Queenswomen, this is the only life we know. What are we going to do, become shopkeepers?” she mocked, then looked around. “What are *any* of us going to do? All our skills are all with a sword or a gun. Either we turn bandit like that bitch Marge Blackwood, or we starve. The only way I can figure we wouldn’t starve is if we used Apple to start a crib of our own. Small gain to him there. Remember, the Bozes may not have clear title to him, but *neither do we*.”

      For some reason they all looked to her. Eldest cleared her throat. “That’s a valid point. Desertion would not be my first choice… nor even my fifth. As for what we do… I don’t know.” She ticked through the points she’d been going over in her head, ever since she’d seen the little rooster. “We could return him to the Bozes and hope for a reward…” She waited until the hisses and growls of outrage died down before continuing. “But knowing Carol Boze, all we’d get would be a bill for his labor the past year.”

      Chuckles sounded, lightening the mood. “We could sell him to private crib on the sly. Young as he is, he’s probably worth a thousand crowns,” she said, hating every word of it. “Divided fourteen ways, that’s about seventy crowns each. Enough to live well for a year, maybe two or three.” She looked at their faces, seeing revulsion there, twin to her own. “Or, as Rose said, we could keep him, desert or cash out the end of our enlistments, and use him to set up our own crib. Ten crowns a night, as long as he stays clean. Then less and less to the increasingly desperate, until some disease or other kills him. Maybe at that point we’d have enough to buy another young boy, use him up too. We could become crib governesses, and be plump, fat and happy, our prosperity built on the misery of the menfolk in our care.”

      She looked around the fire again and some of them were starting to look physically ill, but she bulled on. “We could turn him in to Army Command. Maybe they’d return him to the Bozes, maybe put him in an Order of the Sword crib; He’d last longer with the Order of the Sword than a private crib, though I don’t know if that’s a kindness.” She sighed. “Or we could just let him go. Back to the river. We forget we ever saw him, and hope he doesn’t meet women worse than we are.” Again she checked faces around the fire. Silence, dismay and despair.  “Or”, she went on deliberately, “we keep him, and keep our mouths shut, and look for some better opportunity before someone else cottons to him.”

      The silence stretched on, until at last a faint, hoarse, ragged voice spoke out. “Do you like any of those options, Sergeant?”

      Eldest swallowed. “No, Whisper, can’t say as I *like* any of them.”

      “You’re a good thinker, Eldest, but sometimes you think too damn much.” Whisper stood, long and rangy in the firelight, addressing them all.  “There’s only two things I want to know,” she challenged, straining her damaged voice. “Is there any one of you who would give our good little Apple back to those murdering Boze bitches what whupped and branded him?” She glared, looking around to all of them. “And is there anyone here who would sell him to some plump-fingered crib governess?”

      She looked around as heads shook around the fire, and nodded as the last woman emphatically signaled no. “Damned right! He’s *our* Apple. Our good little Apple. No one gets a bite of our Apple but us!”

      Laughter echoed around the fire, breaking the bleak mood that took hold earlier. Whisper nodded and went on. “Apple may have found us, but we took him in. He was our comrade before we ever knew he was a boy. He’s marched with us, trained with us, fought with us. How many of us would have died at the Hill if he hadn’t gone back for supplies and ammo? He’s lying in that tent,” she pointed, “because he took a bullet to get us those things.”

      That hit them hard. You didn't abandon a comrade, and especially not one who'd bled for you.

      “We’re used to thinking of each other as line soldiers, but we’re not. Not anymore. We’re fourteen women and a boy who will be of age in a year. We’re not sisters in arms anymore, we’re Just. Plain. Sisters. Most of us have never seen a man outside of those poor souls in the cribs, and most not even that. But you all know what a man means, same as I do.  A man means family. Babies to love. A loving husband to raise them. A fire kept for us and a house made into a home. A name, and descendants to honor our memories when we’re gone. That's the dream of every woman ever born. Are we going to let someone else -anyone else- take that dream from us?” she demanded.

      All around the fire spines straightened and looks hardened, hands checking pistols in holsters.

      Whisper took another deep breath, looking at them all, nodding in satisfaction. “I thought not. But if we’re a family, there has to be a head of that family. Someone we trust to do what’s right, to keep the family safe and prosperous. To be the clear thinker.” She looked then to Eldest. “Fortunately, we already have an Eldest, to fill that role.” She turned to look them all in the eye once more. “Agree.”

      Silence touched the circle a moment, disturbed only by the crackling of the fire. Then Nan broke it without hesitation, standing to be counted. “Agree,” she confirmed, and in her wake each woman stood, confirming her allegiance until only old Rose remained, seated and looking deeply at her clenched fist, and the Older of the Sword tattoo thereon, obviously struggling with the decision. Six generations of service was not to be lightly overthrown. But finally she sighed and stood. “Peony would be dead without the supplies Apple brung us. Whether as the girl we thought he was or the boy he is, I owe him a life. And as elder sister I’ll speak for Peony when she gets out of the infirmary.” She looked to Eldest and nodded. “Agree.”

      A long, low sigh went through the women. It was done, they were committed. “But what now?” asked Becca, lost in the enormity of what they had agreed to.

      “You go back to celebrating,” Eldest told them. “Not doing so would invite questions. But drink sparingly of the beer and don’t touch the rum at all. The last thing we need is a drunken sister boasting in her cups.  Meg and Whisper will stay with Apple. I still have a report to submit. Hopefully there will be a reward in all this, and whichever way we leap, we’ll need every crown we can scrape together.”

Chapter Text

      The troop dispersed while Eldest ran through her report one more time. Satisfied, she hand-carried it to Colonel Wellsbury’s tent. She’d reckoned only to pass it on to Blackberry, but to her surprise the Colonel herself took it in hand, asking her to wait in the foyer of the tent while it was reviewed. The wait was long enough to be boring, though not exceedingly so; then she was summoned to the inner room of the vast command tent. It was still much as she had left it last time.  The central table was spread with the map that had sparked her epiphany, the pins still standing, chronicling the search for the Blackwoods. Seated around a small tent stove was Major Drummond, another major and a brace of captains, but she came to rigid attention as she saw the other woman there. The “royal red” hair and green eyes would have been trumpet enough, but the long scar running from the corner of her left eye to her chin sealed it beyond all doubt. The formidable Princess Halley, second eldest of the Queen’s surviving daughters. And if rumor were right, a more able woman than Princess Rennsellaer, the actual Eldest. “Highness,” she saluted.

      Deep, changing sea-green eyes studied her a moment, taking in everything, missing nothing. “At ease, Sergeant; please be seated,” she said, gesturing to an empty chair. The princess lifted the pages of her report, already well-rifled through. “This is an extraordinary report, Sergeant. The Queens and I owe you and your troop a great debt.”  

      Eldest shifted uncomfortably. Princesses were way, way above her pay grade. “We only did our duty, Highness,” she demurred. “Any troop here would have done the same. A good part of it was luck.”

      “Ah, but you’re the ones who did it, Sergeant, and lost two of your sisters in arms in doing so. Please accept my sorrows, and those of the Queens, for your loss.”

      “Thank you, Highness, that means,” her voice caught, “that means a great deal. I’ll be pleased to share that with the rest of my troop.”

      “Please do; every word is true.”

      There was a pause, the princess giving her a few moments to center herself before continuing. “Sergeant, we’ve gone over your report, but if you don’t mind, I’d like to hear a little more of what happened after Marge Blackwood was killed. Two others of her gang were taken alive at that time?”

      Eldest nodded. “Yes, though both were wounded and only one lived long enough to bring back to camp.”

      The princess nodded. “Yes, we’ve questioned her, but she’s merely a hired hand. The one who died of her wounds was Marge’s second.” The princess leaned forward, her expression sharp and intent. “Did she say anything that you know of, before she died? Were you able to question her at all?”

      Eldest thought back. “She was gut-shot, in a lot of pain, and raving. She said things, but most of it was cussing and the rest made no sense.”

      “Do you remember any of it? Anything at all?”

      Eldest furrowed her brow in thought. “Part of it was raving at Marge, how she’d ruined a good thing. She also raged at ‘the hats’, said they’d given Marge delusions of grandeur along with the guns. But she never said what sort of hats they were.”

      “Ah!” nodded the princess, her expression driven. “Hats? She used that word?”

      Eldest nodded. “As I said, she was raving and it made no sense, but it was so odd it sticks in my mind.”

      “And anything else?” prompted the princess.

      Eldest considered. It had been such a tumult when they took the top of the hill, and she’d been much more concerned about her own wounded than any of the Blackwoods. "That's all I can recall, Your Highness. My troop is scattered across the encampment now, but as soon as they're all back to camp and sober I can interview them for anything I might have missed."

      The princess nodded and the various officers except for Wellsbury herself excused themselves, leaving the three of them alone. Princess Halley rose, going over to the map table, looking down at its expanse. "I'm sure you're anxious to get to the festivities yourself Sergeant, so I won't hold you long. But I'd like your opinion on another matter."

      Warily, Eldest sidled up to the table. Had they been found out already? How would the princess even know? Or care? "Of course, Highness."

      The princess tapped on the map. "The Reserve Forest. Originally it was set aside to provide wood for naval vessels. Increasingly, it looks like naval vessels will be being made from iron, not wood, but the forest is still one of the crown jewels, literally, of the Queen's properties. The income from game and timber it provides is considerable. However," her voice hardened, "As the forest has matured, it's also become a haven for criminals, river trash and ne'r do wells. Smuggling, timber theft and poaching are becoming an increasing problem.  The Queen's Justice in Northaven, Heron Landing and Greenhaven do their best, but this year it was Marge Blackwood and her gang. Three years ago it was Heddie McCarty and her Regulators, though thankfully they weren't as well-armed. Before that it was Mad Cassie and before her it was Mistress Dunway. I could go on," she grimaced, "but you see the trend."

      Eldest nodded. "I do."

      The princesses' fingers traced contours in the map. "You've been in there, and by now you know the forest as well as any woman in our service. You're also the one that ran the Blackwoods to their lair." she tapped the hill, the spot on the map where Emma and Diana gave their lives. "So I would ask you; how do we prevent this sort of thing going forward?” she caught Eldest’s stunned look and added hurriedly, “I don’t need an answer immediately, of course. But if you could bend some thoughts in that direction…”

      Eldest held up a hand, transfixed by the sudden vision of it; the hill, on the map, underneath the princess’ fingers. That damnable, but oh-so-defensible hill, in combination with the princesses’ request and her own family’s needs. What was that the older women talked about, about the legendary Tea Whistler? The Golden Moment, or something like that. The moment to grab before it slipped through your fingers forever.

      “Highness, I… actually have thought a bit about it,” she temporized. “I’m sure the Queen’s Justice are doing their best, but they’re obviously stretched thin. You need a permanent force here, to keep an eye on things.”

      Princess Halley nodded. “That’s been done in the past, actually, a small garrison of soldiers encamped in or near the forest, but hasn’t helped. Unfortunately,” she breathed a sigh of frustration, “Small garrisons like that tend to get cannibalized in peacetime, and in times of war it’s even worse. Not to mention the isolated duty out here isn’t popular.”

      Wellsbury nodded, putting in her two quince. “What’s needed is something more akin to the civic guard. A civilian military force, with appropriate powers of arrest within the forest, but not part of the army proper, so a commander short on troops can’t simply expropriate them.”

      “Exactly,” Eldest agreed.

      The princess considered. “But still, a garrison that has to be paid, fed, trained and rotated.” She frowned. “Expensive, and with all the smuggling going on… an expense the Crown can ill afford at the present time.”

      “Perhaps not,” said Eldest, her heart hammering in her chest, threatening to burst.

      “Oh?” inquired the Princess.

      “You could… assign the job permanently. To an appropriate family. You’d have to cede some land in the forest proper for a holding, grant some rights to harvest game and timber, allow some gathering rights on the forest deadfall, that sort of thing. Enough for the family to make a living on. Those concessions would cost, certainly, but with the reduction of timber theft and poaching, I wager the crown would still come out far ahead in the reckoning. And with their own livelihood at stake, that family would be very, very motivated to keep the forest clear of the Blackwoods and their ilk.”

      The princess looked intrigued. “How much land, and what sort of rights do you think would be necessary?”

      Eldest drew a calming breath. How much dare she ask for? She had no idea.  It required about fifty crowns a year to feed and clothe one woman reasonably well. “I’m… not sure. Perhaps twe… no, perhaps forty acres, would be better.  The right to cut… perhaps twen… forty mature trees a year. The right to dam a small stream or two for a mill. Rights to… one deer or other large game per woman per year? And an equal proportion of smaller game? Gathering rights on the deadfall, with… ten percent going to the family? All in return for patrolling the forest, keeping the brigands out, putting down the poachers. They’d still need official sanction though. Call them Royal Foresters, perhaps.”

      The princess's brow creased in thought. “Royal Foresters. That could work, and I agree, the cost seems small against the gain.” She looked over to the Colonel. “Bethany? What do you think?”

      The Colonel cleared her throat, a smile half-suppressed on her lips. “It sounds like just the sort of thing that’s needed, Highness. The problem would be finding the right women to fill the job- and it’s a very big job. Not just any group of women would do, not even militarily-trained women.”

      The princess nodded knowingly. “That’s the rub, of course.  We’d need at least a full troop of women, trained in tracking and unconventional warfare, as comfortable on horseback as on foot, crack shots, used to operating independently while still coordinating with a larger whole. A tough billet to fill, to be sure,” she glanced meaningfully over to Eldest. “Where on Earth would we find women like that?”

      It began to dawn on Eldest that she had been set up. Perhaps even before the Colonel asked for her report. But in this case why should she object? “Ah, Highness… It might be I could find a troop like that for you. My own.” She nodded at the map. “We already know the forest as well as any. My troop’s record and actions speak for themselves. We’d need… I don’t know what all we’d need, but it would start with honorable discharges, our muster-out pay, things like that. But if you need Royal Foresters, we’re your girls.”

      “That would be easy enough to arrange,” replied the princess promptly. “But are you sure your women would follow you? This… isn’t something that can be ordered.”

      Eldest considered her words, grateful for the vote that Whisper’s speech had forced. Would she have dared this, without the knowledge of that support at her back? She took a deep breath, committing herself, committing them all a little more. “My troop has been unitary a long time, Highness. That’s no one’s fault- promotions come rarer in peacetime- but we’re pretty close-knit. Almost a family. I think they’ll follow where I lead. Anyone who doesn’t, of course, can stay in the Army. But I think they’ll jump at the chance.”

      The princess nodded. “But there’s an issue you may not have considered. The Order of the Sword cribs are for active duty women only. You cannot be detached from the army, and still have access to the cribs. That’s a tradition not even my mothers the Queens would tamper with, let alone myself as a mere princess. Without access to a fertile male, a family dies within a single generation.”

      Eldest made a show of considering. “Men can be bought, Highness. If we have an income we can save for a husband, just like the rest of Queensland.”

      “That’s true enough,” said the princess thoughtfully. “Let me consider. It’s more important to do this right than to do it quickly, and I’ve held you from the festivities long enough. We’ll speak on this again. In the meantime, go enjoy yourself; you’ve earned it.”

      Eldest nodded and rose. “Thank you, Highness, I’m at your disposal, of course,” she promised, bowed, and left, almost floating on air.

Chapter Text

      Princess Halley watched the Sergeant go before turning to Wellsbury. "Well, that was an easier sell than I thought it would be."

      "That's what I love about that woman," Wellsbury rumbled. "Other officers and non-coms will tell me why things can't be done. Tell that Eldest what you need and she finds a way to do it. Breaks my heart, though," she glared at the Princess. "Those are my eyes and ears you're expropriating there."

       "They'll be replaced," Halley promised.

       "Not with as good, I'll wager. I’d like a full column of Rangers, not just a single troop."

      Halley quirked a smile. "Everyone wants Queen's Rangers. No one wants to pay their upkeep. Fine, though. I'll find you a column. Anything else?”

      "Promise me you’ll do right by Eldest and her troop, and not just the absurd minimum she just asked for. This is a huge undertaking, and while I know they’ll have the help of the Queen’s Justice, even the garrison in Northaven is half a day’s ride away. This could work out wonderfully for them; it could also get them killed, and quickly at that.”

      Halley nodded. “I’ll have you look over the grant personally, just to be sure,” she promised before turning her attention back to the map. “It all connects,” she murmured. “The smuggling, the petty thefts, the bandit gangs… the murder of my father and sisters… it all comes back to the River and the Hats, whoever they are. I just have to figure out how. Or, especially, who.”

Chapter Text

      Eldest arrived back at camp to find Meg sitting with Apple, though she rose to come to the tent door. "How is he?" she whispered.

      "Sleeping," Meg whispered back. "Though he woke earlier and was able to drink and even eat some. He asked for an apple, of course,” she smiled.  “He's looking better, more color in his cheeks. He still needs to rest though."

      "Of course. Why don't you take a break, I'll watch him for a while. Is there anything I should know?"

      Meg sounded amused. "Just that, in watching him, I noticed his hair is darkening underneath the gold. I think he's just a childhood towhead, he's not going to keep the color."

      "Oh, that's too bad. He was adorable with that dandelion-mop even when we thought he was a girl."

      Meg nodded. "The funny part is the color that's coming in underneath. I could be wrong, but it seems to be a deep mahogany… red."

      Eldest thought on that a moment and then the humor of it hit her. "Meg Ranger, are you telling me that our Apple is actually *ripening*?"

      Meg chuckled. "Ay yup," nodded and left while Eldest settled herself into the camp chair beside the cot.

      Apple lay on his side on the cot, facing away from her, his soft breathing filling the tent just as much as the golden light from the oil-lamp. Softly she reached out to ruffle his hair, seeing the darker roots Meg spoke of. She hadn’t thought the gentle touch would wake him, but a few minutes later his voice came softly.

      “Sergeant Eldest?” he asked, softly, quietly.

      “I’m here, Apple.”

      “Am I a prisoner?” he asked in that same small, fragile voice, still facing away from her.

      Eldest drew in a long breath. ‘Yes’ might be the most honest answer, but not the one Apple needed to hear. “No,” she gave his shoulder a gentle squeeze. “You're our good little Apple- maybe just a bit bruised," she smiled. "You need to rest and get better."

      He stifled a sob. "You should have let me go."

      "Apple, sweetie, no. Don't you ever say that. I've never been so frightened in my life, seeing you with that noose around your neck. Don't you even think doing that again. You’re not alone any more. You have people who love you."

      He was quiet a long time, so much so that she wondered if he’d fallen asleep again. "Are you going to sell me?" he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

      "Never.”

      “You should. Keeping me will just cause trouble. The news will get out, and that Carol Boze will come for me.”

      “I’d like to see her try,” growled Eldest.

      Apple turned on the cot to look at her, those china-blue eyes standing with tears. “Don’t say that. You don’t know her like I do. She’s like a rabid jackal, especially when it comes to property she considers hers. She bites and doesn’t let go, and throws up on food she can’t take herself, just to ruin it for others. She’s made of hate and spite. She’ll hurt you and anyone else I care about, just because I care about you.”

      Eldest considered, measuring Apple’s words with what she knew of Carol Boze, finding the two uncomfortably matched. She patted his arm. “Oh, Apple, sweetie. I may not know Boze as well as you, but I know her well enough. She may be lowdown mean as a snake and twice as spiteful, but deep down, she’s yellow. She wouldn’t want to face even one Queen’s Ranger with a gun in her hand. I think she’ll think twice before tangling with fourteen.”

      The tears flowed down his face. “I’m not worth it, Eldest, I’m not worth it. Just sell me.”

      She reached out to cup his face. “Apple, sweetie, no! Why would you ever say such a thing?”

      “I got my mamma killed,” he sobbed. “I got my mamma killed, Sophonsiba Boze, she tol’ me, my mamma always tol’ me always go deep in the woods and crouch to piss, but I stood one time, an’ Heddie Boze, she saw me. That’s when they called Mamma up to the house, it’s *my* fault. It’s my fault they killed her! Just throw me in a crib to rot!”

      Her arms reached out of their own accord to gather him into her arms and hold him, his tears dampening her shirt as the sobs and tremors ran through him. So there was a reason beyond just being found out that had led him to that awful tree. “Apple, honey, no. Just, no,” she murmured. “Evil, greedy women killed your mamma, *not you*. You’re a boy, the gods made you that way, and boys stand to piss. That’s not your fault. Menfolk are a gift to be treasured, not to commit murder over.”

      Of course, she knew, it was because they were such treasures that women fought and killed for them, but Apple didn’t need to hear that either. For a long time she held him comfortingly, stroking the wonderful softness of his hair, murmuring soft words to soothe him.

      “What’s going to happen to me?” he asked at last.

      Eldest considered. “There’s… a lot of clay pigeons in the air right now. You may not realize, Apple, but our troop has been a bit unusual these past few years. Usually women are flowing in and out of a troop all the time. Promoted up, mustered out, or transferred for better opportunities elsewhere. Our troop has stayed intact a long time now, so we’ve become closer than’s usual as a result. Almost a family. It seems we impressed the princess, though. She may have a job for us. One where we’d become a family in truth. If we’re to be a family, though… we’d need a husband. You wouldn’t happen to know where we could find one, would you?”

      The moment stretched, and stretched until she thought it might break. “I wouldn’t think you’d want me,” he finally murmured. “Women want beautiful men.”

      “Apple, you’ve never owned a mirror, have you?”

      “No, Eldest,” he answered, puzzled. “How did you know?”

      “Because if you’d ever owned a mirror, or even looked at one, you’d know that you’re the most beautiful boy I’ve ever seen.”

      “Me?" he asked in disbelief. "Have you seen a lot of boys?”

      She laughed a little. “In truth, no. But,” she tapped her Order of the Sword tattoo, “I’ve seen a few men. And you’re the most beautiful one I’ve seen by far.”

      He seemed unsure of what to say. "I'm… I'm not very biddable," he confessed.

      Apple was by far the most biddable of her troopers but she didn’t say so. Men, she’d heard, had their pride. Instead she answered, "I'd noticed that. But I've heard tell that if a woman wants a little sauce she has to be willing to put up with a little spirit."

      “What… What if I say no?” he asked in a small voice.

      Hurt flowed through Eldest, at the implicit rejection. But looking into Apple’s eyes she realized there was no rejection there, only a certain wariness. Her heart swelled with anger. As a boy Apple should have been held, loved, cuddled and protected from the moment of his birth. He shouldn’t even be capable of saying no. He should never have had to learn how. Instead he’d been torn from his mother, raped, brutalized, starved and forced to run and survive on his own like a stray dog. It was small wonder he was mistrustful. And perhaps rightly so. ‘Because the truth is that men can’t be permitted to say no. It’s too important that they say yes.’

      But Apple, betrayed by the very system meant to protect him, absolutely didn’t need to hear that. She pursed her lips, groping for the right words. Nothing came, but then she realized it didn't have to. The words were already written for her, in terms Apple, of all her troopers, would accept.

      “Apple,” she said at last, “when the gods made man and woman, the chalice of life was given to women, but the spark of life was given to men. Men are the lifegivers. That’s a precious, precious gift, and there are so few of you already. Without you, womankind dies. If-” her voice caught, “if our family doesn’t suit you, we… we can find one that does. But you need to say yes, to some family, somewhere. The gift you’ve been entrusted with is too precious to keep to yourself.”

      He looked at her with such longing it was almost too painful to bear, to see hope shine in his eyes, and then die, looking down. “But Eldest… what if I’m not clean?” he asked, forlorn. “The Bozes… had me. Almost every night, for almost a year. A man should come pure to his marriage bed, and I… I…” Those beautiful eyes swam with tears and his words trailed off in sob. “They ruined everything,” he breathed softly as she held him. “My whole life.”

      Eldest had not thought it possible to hate Carol Boze more than she did already, and now she found that what she had felt before was merely intense dislike. “Apple,” she said firmly, tilting his chin up, so that he would look at her. “You’ve been with us the better part of a year. Have you had any sores or rashes?”

      He looked back at her, not daring to hope. “No, Eldest.”

      “No odd spots, fevers, tingling in hands or feet, unusual bodily discharges?”

      “No.”

      “See?” she cupped his cheek. “You’re clean, my darling, I’m sure of it. Whatever else you can say about Carol Boze… and believe me, I could say a great many, many things about her… she runs that family like a river packet. She knows all it takes is one loose sister to infect an entire family, husband and all. If even one of those sisters tried slipping off to a crib that Carol Boze would have her staked out over an anthill next morning.”

      “That’s not a joke,” he choked. “They did it once to a rustler they caught. Her screams lasted half the night. Only time I ever heard Carol Boze sing,” he shuddered.

      “We’ll get you checked,” she promised. “By a real doctor. But I already know what she’ll find; nothing. You’re a beautiful, clean boy, and any family in Queensland would want you.”

      His arms tightened around her, and he buried his face in her shoulder, “Eldest,” he murmured, “if I had my choice of any family in Queensland, from the Queens on down, I’d choose this one. I don’t know why you’d want me; but if you do, I don’t want no other.”

      “We do, sweetie. We loved you even before we knew you were a boy.”

      “Truly?”

      “Truly. Whisper put it best; ‘No one gets a bite of our Apple but us.’”

      A shy smile and a blush rewarded her words. “Good,” he said. “Because I’ve wanted to do this for almost a year now.” He raised his head and suddenly his lips were warm on hers, even his breath smelling of apples, his body young, warm and alive in her arms. Stunned, she touched her lips after the kiss, scarcely daring to believe it had happened.

      “Was that okay?” he asked, suddenly fearful again.

      “It was wonderful,” she murmured hoarsely. “I’ve just never been kissed by a boy before.”

      “But- you’ve visited the Order of the Sword cribs,” he said uncertainly.

      She smiled sadly. “The men in the cribs don’t kiss you,” she told him before leaning down. “Let’s try that again.”

      Her second kiss was just as wonderful as the first, and far longer. After they came up for air, he asked, “your other visits, to the cribs… did you ever, you know, catch a baby?”

      “Three miscarriages, all in the first trimester,” she said softly. “After the third I didn’t have the heart to go back.”

      Another kiss, this one gentler. “I’m sorry. Perhaps we can do better.”

      “Oh, Apple honey, it’s probably already too late for me,” she told him sadly. “It’s definitely too late for Rose. But it’s not too late for Sarah, Peony or even Whisper. Our younger sisters will have to supply the little foresters we’ll need.”   

      “Foresters?”

      “Maybe we’ll take that to be the family name. Speaking of names,” She tousled his hair. “We’ll have to call you Apple for a while yet, but afterwards… Should we call you Jonni?”

      He thought a few moments, then gave her a shy smile. “Jonni was what my mamma called me. But I’d rather be the Apple of your eye.”

      She laid him back on the cot and kissed his forehead. “You are that, love. Now you sleep and get better. You’re safe now. You’re ours, we love you and we’re not going to lose you.”

      He snuggled back into the blankets. “I know,” he murmured sleepily and closed his eyes.

Chapter Text

      It took three days for the camp to fully return to normal, three days of light duty and occasional, anxious watches over Apple. Hope told them it was far too late to stitch the wound by the time they knew about it, but with rest and quiet it healed; so much so he was begging to be up and about long before he should. The hell of it was they had to let him up, they were getting concerned inquiries from Major Kiverly and others who missed their favorite drummergirl. Eldest had managed to paper those concerns over with 'too much rum and not enough girl’” but that wouldn't hold another day. So that morning she helped him dress in his uniform, scowling all the while. 

      "Don't you worry," Apple told her breezily. "Papa Bear taught me women only see what they want to see, or what they 'spect to see. It takes a man to see things as they are, and I's the only one in camp!"

      Eldest chuckled. "If that's the case, why didn't your Papa Bear spot you?"

      "Oh he did, right away. He was plumb tickled pink at the thought of a boy wandern' around free like I was. He told me t'go see the world for him while I could, but he made sure I knew how to be a man fer when I got too old to pass no more."

      Heart in her throat, she watched him scamper off, sure that he'd be abducted and raped before he'd gone a dozen steps. Once you knew, you couldn't *not* see the maleness in him, the lithe, gazelle-like power of his movements, the sculpted elegance of his muscles, the set of his jaw and face. But there might just be something to his Papa Bear's observation after all. A day of helping out around the camp, from the mess to supply to courier duties, and he scampered right back home, none the worse for wear. Skipping up to her tent, he asked for admittance and handed her a carefully folded note.

      “My last courier of the day,” he told her.

      Eldest read the note, then called to the troop. "There's a Regimental muster at evening flags. Best uniforms and spit-shined, ladies!"

      Groans sounded throughout the camp, but her women bent to their duties, brushing their best coats, polishing brass and oiling leather. Eldest ran them through three inspections before she was satisfied with the result, but the Colonel's note had specified "best mess dress," and it simply wasn't possible to be too spit-shined when that was the order of the day.

      When the time for the muster came, Eldest formed up the troop, Apple in the lead with her -his- drum. She scowled at that. Men, let alone boys, belonged in the home where wives and sisters could keep them safe. Yet not bringing him along would look suspicious. There was nothing to do but grit her teeth and pray that the disguise that had held so long would hold just a little longer.

      She gave the troop a final once-over, a pang going through her at the missing row in their ranks, the row Emma and Diana would have filled. Life went on, though. That was the way of Army life. Armies marched and the fallen were left behind. Not this time, though, she swore. If this thing with the princess came to fruition, if they were actually granted land, she’d be sure to claim that one spot. Emma’s and Diana’s graves would not be lost to weeds and brush as so many soldiers were. They would be tended by daughters who were taught the bravery and sacrifice that lay underneath the stones. 

      She addressed her women. “Smart steps, straight backs and heads high girls. When you’ve bought Ranger pride you’re entitled to show it.” With a nod to Apple they set out behind the tattoo of the drum, heading to the makeshift parade ground at the center of the camp.

      As they approached the field they found that the rest of the regiment was already there, drawn up in ranks facing the flags, a modest knot of red drawn up with them, marking where the Princesses’ marines were drawn up as well.

      A chill of dread went through Eldest and she hurriedly checked her ticker. Nothing was more humiliating than being late to muster, but they were right on the time the Colonel’s note had specified. The reason became clear as they drew nearer and cheers started to rise all around them.

      Blackberry intercepted them and guided them to the place of honor in front of the podium, rather than their usual place to the rear of 7^th company. It looked like some awards were in order. For a moment Eldest cringed inside; Rangers were never comfortable in the limelight. But then she took her own advice and straightened. Why not? No one could say they hadn’t earned it.

      The muster began with Honors to the Queens, and then a thousand throats sang “Cold Iron”, the song of the 22nd, followed by the Battle Hymn of the Marines. Then the Colonel herself took the podium and Apple was called up to play taps as they doffed caps to murmur “Remembrance of the Fallen” as the names of the women who had given their lives to stop the Blackwoods were read, ending with Diana’s and Emma’s. Eldest had to fight back tears at the beauty of Apple’s playing with the terror that it would occur to someone else to ask where the abdominal strength came from to voice such pure notes. Then a hush fell as Princess Halley herself took the podium, her “royal red” hair and stiff, painful walk identifying her even without the Colonel’s booming introduction.

Chapter Text

      Princess Halley said all the right words that day, touching the heartstrings of every woman there. There was remembrance of the fallen, praise for the living, reminders of who and what they were. That they were soldiers of the realm; protectors and defenders, the lionesses that patrolled lonely in the night so that menfolk and babes could sleep soundly.

      Eldest remembered marveling at the power and poignancy of the princess’s speech, all from a woman no older than Sarah. With the Queens, and princesses such as Halley, the country was surely in safe hands. Eldest recalled it said that it was a pity that the “Accidental Eldest” Princess Rennsallaer had survived, making the much-more-capable Halley second eldest, but hopefully the Accidental Eldest would allow herself to be guided by the wisdom of her younger sister.

      Then of course had come the moment her troop was called from the ranks, to the podium itself, to kneel before the princess and receive the honors they had won. The first awards had been for Emma and Diana, black ribbons of Death for Country which Eldest gravely received on their behalves. Another Star of Merit for her, for having tracked the Blackwoods to their lair. A Queen’s Order of the Lioness for Fawn, for having struck the fatal blow on Marge Blackwood. A promotion for Eldest, to Sergeant-Major, for having led the troop that ended the Blackwood menace. Then the Queen’s Medal of Valor for every one of them, even Apple; the Princess having apparently decided she did not care that the recipient was underage.

      The Medal of Valor was the third highest award in the Queen’s army, behind only the Medal of Honor and the Victory Cross, so Eldest relaxed, sure there were no further awards would be forthcoming. But the princess wasn’t done, oh no, not by a long shot. The honors they’d won were merely icing on the cake. The cake was discharges for the whole troop, and the hereditary position of Royal Foresters. A grant of land within the forest; a full manor grant, over a thousand acres. Rights to harvest game and timber. Water rights and mill rights. Eldest was simply flabbergasted at the bounty given them, though she managed to keep the stupefied expression off her face. Her troopers, she was glad to note, managed to do the same- all except Whisper, who had the most ridiculous cat-in-the-cream grin plastered on her face the whole time, despite a surreptitious kick or two. It all seemed too good to be real, but as princess bid them rise and the cheers of the assembled regiment rose around them one thing was certain; nothing would ever be the same again.

Chapter Text

      The princess had met with her privately, afterwards. “Sorry to ambush you so publicly,” she half-apologized. “But exceptional service requires exceptional rewards; and after reading your record, I admit I wanted to be darn sure you didn’t get away from me.”

      “No chance of that now,” Eldest had all but squeaked, still overwhelmed.

      “It’s an enormous job, I know,” Halley had pointed to the map. “Be assured I don’t expect you to master it all at once, or alone. The Queen’s Justice in Northaven and Heron Landing have been asked to give you every assistance, and I’ve a writ that will allow you to requisition troops from the garrison at Fort Kindee if you need them. But the eyes and ears that watch the forest have to be yours.”

      “It *is* going to take time,” Eldest admitted, “but I promise you, we won’t let you down.”

      Halley winced a little smile around a still-healing red line that ran from the corner of her left eye down the line of her chin, to the corner of her mouth. “You know, that’s exactly what your Colonel Wellsbury told me. You and your women may keep your weapons and your uniforms, of course. I’ve also informed the stable governesses that you’re permitted to take one horse each as well. In addition, Major Kiverly has been instructed to issue you whatever you need in the way of tents, bedrolls, rations and ammunition.”

      “Highness, this is too much!”

      “I disagree. Requisition what you need and don’t economize. Remember you are doing me the favor, not the other way around. Winter is coming, and you don’t have a lot of time to be ready for it.”

      “Yes, Highness.”

      “Finally, there’s this,” she handed Eldest a simple calling card. “Please be careful with it.”

      Eldest read the card aloud. “Cira Black, 42 West Bellamy Way, Mayfair?”

      “One of my alter egos. It can be surprisingly difficult for me –or any royal- to have direct contact with someone outside the palace. We’re hedged in by custom, by protocol, by security. My Eldest mother,” she gave another almost-smile, ‘Often refers to the Palace as ‘the crown jewel of the Queensland prison system’, and it is. But a letter sent to that address will always reach me, and will only pass through one set of hands to do so. If there’s something you need, any support I can give, I want to know about it. I want you to succeed. You must succeed. We cannot have another Marge Blackwood setting up shop here.”

      “Amen to that, Highness. Rest assured that as long as my women and I are here, none of their ilk will take root in the forest again. Or at least, not for long.”

      “Good woman.”

      Eldest rose to go, but a last thought drifted by her. “Whatever became of that poor stray the Blackwoods enslaved?”

      “She wasn’t of much use, I’m afraid. We questioned her, but she knew very little. The Blackwoods didn’t do their planning around her and when they were around her they weren’t intent on conversation. Unless you want a litany of how cruel women can be to their own, she’s a dead end. She’s a closed-mouthed one too, as you might expect. We really didn’t get much more out of her than her name, Clair Cutter.” The princess snorted. “Clair Timber-Poacher, more like.”

      “What’s going to happen to her?”

      Halley considered. “I suppose I ought to do you a favor and hang her for timber theft, but I can’t bring myself to hang a twelve year old on a maybe, even though that maybe is almost certainly true. Besides, my Elder sister has a soft heart. She’d never approve. I suppose we’ll drop her off at an orphan’s work-house. She’ll at least be fed that way, and hopefully learn a trade that doesn’t involve robbing the queen’s purse.”

      Eldest shuddered inside. If half of what she’d heard about the work-houses was true, the poor girl would probably rather hang. “We’ll take her,” she found herself saying. “If you’re willing, we’ll take her.”

      Halley arched a brow. “A small matter. Though if you’re looking for gratitude out of her, I think you’ll find none. She’ll slip away at first opportunity and return to the life she knows.”

      “Perhaps. But lately I’ve found that small charities can have a very large return… sometimes in ways you’d never expect.”

      The princess shrugged. “Suit yourself. She’s yours.”

Chapter Text

      Taking leave of the 22nd was a hurried affair, not at all the way she would have envisioned it a year ago. Of course, with a normal retirement you knew it was coming and there was time to say all the appropriate goodbyes and farewells. Not this time. The camp was frantic with the preparations for leaving. With the Blackwoods dead their Marisburg posting still awaited them, and the days grew shorter with the season. They would have to hurry to get there before the first snows. Or the 22nd would, which was an odd thought in itself. The regiment had been her home the past eight years and it was difficult to think of herself separately from it, but now it was. She and her troop would be left behind to guard what their courage had won.

      Despite a promise of carte blanche from the princess, she hardly knew what to ask for from Supply. Fortunately she’d put the question to her new family, and Apple pounced on the challenge, writing up their needs into a neat list, carefully calibrated against what the 22nd might be able to offer. Well, the home was the domain of a man, after all. So it was that she greeted a harried Major Kiverly in the supply tent, shopping list in hand.

      “Ah, Sergeant Eldest. Come to rob me yet again?” the Major asked, seeing her approach.

      “I haven’t robbed you the first time, yet,” she protested, handing over the list. “Did the Colonel or the princess speak to you about this?”

      “They did. And you’re robbing me of the best supply clerk I’ve found in a decade, isn’t that enough?” she replied, looking over the list. “And in her own handwriting, too,” she mourned.

      “We found her first,” Eldest returned stoutly.

      “Supply would have been a better fit, you know,” Kiverly sighed. “She could have worked safe forty years and retired a colonel, if not a brigadier.”

      “If she stayed in the Army you’d be right. As it is… We’ll take good care of her.”

      “Ha! It looks more like she’s taking care of you,” Kiverly returned tartly, waving the list before peering at it once more. “A buckboard, springboard *and* an officer’s gig?” she exclaimed, reading down the list. “No, absolutely not, you’d think the girl didn’t know we’re moving out. I need every wagon we’ve got, if we’re to get to Marisburg on time.”

      “The princess…”

      “Don’t speak to me of princesses when I have troops and supplies to move. Though I suppose I have few older wrecks that won’t survive the journey anyway. I can part with them.”

      “How generous.”

      “You can thank me later. And you’ll need more rations than this. If that girl has a flaw it’s that she measures everything by her own yardstick. The average trooper would starve on what she eats, even if you count the stuff she squirrels away.” The major made a few notations, crossing out Apple’s figures and substituting her own.

      “You knew about that?”

      “Of course. That’s how I knew she was a good fit. A good Supply officer always hoards more than she needs. You never know when it might come in handy.” She frowned, scanning further down the list. “Now look at this. Tent stoves! She wants tent stoves! With winter coming on we’ll need every tent stove we’ve got, I shouldn’t wonder.”

      “Perhaps some old and rusty ones,” Eldest suggested placatingly.

      “I might have a few,” Kiverly conceded grudgingly.

      “Along with a few old Ketchum grenades?”

      Major Kiverly gave her a shrewd look at that. “It worked out in the end, didn’t it? But before you go thinking ill of me, I managed to foist most of the useless things off on Major Riva at Santi-Judith so we didn’t have to haul them back across half the country. Had to keep some, though, we’re required to have them in inventory, just in case. But then we got a directive that they’re no longer required munitions, so it was just a matter of marking them as expended in training, and voila, they no longer clutter my books.”

      “Except for actually getting rid of them.”

      “Girls will be girls, and what girl doesn’t like blowing things up? Win-win. I didn’t even need to point them out to her.”

      “It worked out this time, I’ll grant you that.”

      “I’ll have your wagons packed this evening, you’ll be ready to roll first thing in the morning.”

      “Thank you, Major.”

      “Take care, Eldest.”

Chapter Text

      The troop met at dawn, their breath misting in the brisk fall air while Apple supervised loading their tents and gear into the buckboard. Herra’s horse Prettyboy was hitched to the gig while Peony’s Butterscotch was hitched to the buckboard. Eldest’s new horse Sterling and Meg’s Balderdash were hitched to the springboard. She’d claimed Sterling from the remounts corral. She wasn’t the dashing cavalier that Sultana had been but she was young, sweet-tempered and absolutely rock-steady, all virtues Eldest reckoned would be more valuable in their new lives than being gallant in a charge.

      Eldest did a quick count and all her women were present except Peony and Rose. They would be departing with the 22nd, to be dropped off in Northford so that Peony could recover at the infirmarium there. Creating a homestead in the wilderness was not a task for a woman recovering from a chest wound. She also checked on their prisoner, little Clair, who sat in irons at the back of the springboard. Satisfied, she was about to give the order to move out when a tall form detached itself from the crowd of well-wishers and came up to her.

      “Colonel,” she braced and saluted.

      The Colonel granted her a rare smile. “You’re mustered out now, civilian, you don’t have to do the saluting now.”

      Eldest flushed in embarrassment. “Sorry. Old habits.”

      “But good ones. I’m going to miss you, Sergeant, and not just for your eyes and ears.”

      “You’ll make do. I hear you’ll be getting new Rangers soon.”

      “So I’ve been promised. The first file ought to be waiting for us in Marisburg, led by a certain 1st Lieutenant Colt.”

      “Barbari Colt? I hadn’t heard she’d made first, but she’s a good woman. She’ll do for you, ma’am.”

      “Glad to hear it.” The Colonel surveyed them. “Well, I’ve never been one for long goodbyes, but I did want to wish you well. With a princess backing you I doubt you’ll need any help from me, but write occasionally, if you would. The mail catches up eventually.”

      “Of course.”

      “And Eldest… if there’s any sign of the sickness coming back, even the least hint of that hell-disease…”

      “We leave. Princess or no,” promised Eldest.

      “Smart woman. And you, scamp,” she called to Apple. “I haven’t forgotten those foals I owe you. It may take a while to find some wives that suit Fat Ninny, but rest assured, I’m looking. Preferably ones that will give their daughters some brains.”

      Apple blushed from his perch on the buckboard. “Awww, and here I thought you’d be callin’ ‘im by that fancy stable name what the Duchess tol’ you.”

      “When a name fits, it sticks. Twice now he’s gotten himself stuck between two tent guylines and couldn’t figure out he could just back up.”

      Apple grinned. “Well, what more would you expect from a boy?” he squeaked.

      Eldest heart thumped and she hurriedly intervened, “Oh my, look at the sun. We’ll be marching in the dark if this keeps up.”

      “True enough,” conceded the Colonel. “Fair trails, Eldest,” she said, offering her hand.

      Eldest grinned a desperate little grin. “Fair trails… Bethany,” she returned, taking her hand and offering firm grip. With that she climbed aboard the springboard beside Herra and waved their little column forward.

      She didn’t breathe easy until the camp was out of sight and the forest embraced them. It was one thing to read about how boy’s voices changed as they grew into men. It was quite another to hear it actually happening. They had left not a moment too soon.

Chapter Text

      They followed the old market road that had taken them into the Dales, and as before the forest closed in around them until they were trooping through forest loam, lost in a world of green. The shortest road to their new home was impassable to wagons so they had to take the long way around and the promise of better roads. She called halt around noon, her women spreading out to eat and relax as Herra and Catherine stood guard. She’d made sure their prisoner had rations as well, but when it came time to continue she went to the girl, who stared sullenly back.

      ‘Perhaps I just have a soft spot for waifs,’ she thought to herself. The girl was thin, with a pinched face and wide, haunted brown eyes and ragged brown hair to match. If ever there was a child of the forest, this was she.

      “Come with me,” she ordered, helping her down from the wagon, the chain of the irons that secured the girl’s wrists rattling as she came down.

      Eldest took her a little ways off the trail and the girl’s breath suddenly quickened, eyes reflecting fear.

      “Relax, I’m not going to hurt you.”

      “That’s what the Blackwoods said when they took me,” the girl returned softly. “What are you going to do to me? What do you want?”

      Eldest sat on a handy boulder, facing her. “I want the truth, Clair. Is your mother still alive?”

      The girl’s face shuttered, silent.

      “Any sisters?”

      Sullen silence. But there was a little spark of fear that hadn’t been there before.

      “So. You do still have family in these woods.”

      “Whatever you’re gonna do, go ahead and do it. I won’t help you.”

      “I’m not asking you to. I’d like you to help yourself.” Eldest produced the key to the shackles, unlocking them, leaving the girl rubbing her chafed wrists in suspicion.

      Eldest eyed her speculatively. “I’d like to think the gods have a better use for you than dangling dead on a rope, or slaving away in some orphan’s hell-house.”

      Still sullen silence.

      “Suit yourself.” Eldest passed her a haversack. “There’s three days food, water, knife, cord and firestriker there. Can you find your way back to your kin from here?

      The girl clutched the haversack, still suspicious. “Yes.”

      “Then you go to them. And you tell them they need to find an honest trade. The days of the Queens ignoring the forest are over.”

      “The Queens have so much, and we have so little!”

      “Thieving is still not the answer. If I catch you poaching after this –timber or game- it will go hard on you. That’s a promise.”

      Still suspicious, the girl took a tentative step back, then another, then a flurry as she turned tail and ran, vanishing into the woods.

      Sighing, Eldest rejoined their little train, to be greeted by Meg’s sour look. “You know we’re just going to have catch her again. That kind doesn’t change.”

      “Possibly,” Eldest admitted. Then, at Meg’s look, “probably,” she conceded. “But we’re getting a new start. Seems only fair to spread the blessing around.”

Chapter Text

      That first winter was hard. It helped that the Blackwoods had been getting ready for it as well and there were supplies already gathered and shelters built, but the Blackwoods hadn’t had horses to feed. So there was still wood to be gathered, feed to be stockpiled, tools and clothing to be purchased. They’d barely had time to get it all in place before the snows came, shutting down all hope of progress until spring. They hunted, patrolled and learned the land but mostly it was a cold, bitter time huddled around stoves, dreaming of spring.

      Which wasn’t to say there weren’t a few bright spots. The first was that Whisper and Herra had found the perfect spot for a mill. That had been fairly easy because there had already been a mill there before the sickness, and finding it had consisted of noticing a spot on the map marked ‘mill’ and going there. The location was perfect and though the mill itself was gone the dam and raceway were still in fairly good shape. That brought excitement and something to do as they planned out the building that would be key to their financial future.

      The second bright spot was that Rose hadn’t been idle as she watched over Peony’s recovery in Northaven. She’d lined up masons and carpenters to restore the manor, and Peony was improving steadily. The risk of infection was past, so Rose promised it was only a matter of time before the whole family was together. That promise was kept as the snows melted, the woods greened, and their two flower girls rejoined them. Apple had cooked a small feast for the occasion, and as they gathered around the table Eldest took stock of Peony. She still looked a little wan and Eldest wondered if she hadn’t pushed it too far, but she had apparently insisted. Infirmariam food made her nostalgic for the 7^th company mess, which told you all you needed to know right there.

      “Besides,” she whispered to Eldest as they ate. “I wanted to see if Rose was telling the truth about Apple. When she first told me at Northaven I didn’t believe her, thought it was an older-sister joke, but holy mothers it’s true, isn’t it? How did we not spot him before?”

      “I wonder that myself. And we’re Rangers to boot, makes it doubly embarrassing. But Apple says women only see what we expect to see, and why would we ever be expecting to see a boy running around an army?”

      Peony drew breath to answer, but Apple rapped on the table for attention and the chatter died down. “Now that everyone’s here,” he smiled at Rose and Peony, “I want you all to see something.”

      He laid a bunch of stalky, leafy greens on the table, breaking off a leaf to pass it around. Eldest took and examined it in her turn. It was distinctive; deep green, toothed and vaguely reminiscent of a swamp maple leaf, right down to the reddish stem. Topped by a spray of pretty, spiky white flowers, it was an attractive plant.

      “This is called snakeroot,” Apple explained. “I found it near that kettlehole by the south pasture. It’s a western plant, I’m real surprised to find it this far east. We can’t have it around here. Any good plainswoman will ride a dozen miles out of her way to rip up a snakeroot and make sure it’s dead. We have to do the same.”

      “Poisonous, is it?” asked Nan.

      “Of a nasty sort. Usually a horse or buffalo don’t eat enough to do more’n make ‘em woozy. Most even build up a sort of resistance to it. But the poison gets into their meat & milk and builds up there. Then you get sick cowpunchers and dead foals. You find some, you yank it up, root and all, then burn it or leave it somewhere the stock can’t get it to dry. Once it’s dry it’s dead, but still poisonous for all that. Safest thing to do is burn it.”

      Eldest cleared her throat, looking around the table. “You heard the betrothed, ladies. Search and destroy.”

      “Like firebush pods,” Rose muttered under her breath.

      “Like what?” asked Apple, not catching her words.

      “Nothing, beloved, nothing,” she told him cheerfully as titters ran around the table. He looked about puzzled, but then shrugged and sat, sweeping his lengthening hair out of his eyes with an adorable flip of his head.

      Taking all that in Peony leaned over to Eldest again. “When did you say his birthday was?”

Chapter Text

      As Apple's birthday drew closer, the issue of how they would register the marriage loomed in increasing importance. One didn't have to register a marriage of course, there were a half a dozen ways around the requirement, but failure to do so introduced all manner of complications in inheritance, and as Royal Foresters they were expected to uphold the law, not look for ways around it.

      The family discussed it around the breakfast table one morning, as Apple cleaned up by the cistern, out of earshot. Nan was the closest thing they had to a law-clerk, just as Hope was their closest thing to a medician, so they put the problem to her.

      "Even twenty years ago this wouldn't have been an issue," she commented. "Records clerks would look the other way, there's always a strong streak of sympathy for a successful husband-raider. But the world grows smaller, and men are supposed to have a paper trail documenting ownership now. This is exactly the problem the Bozes faced, when they had him."

      "Can we try the same solution?" asked Bea. "We could get a copy of his birth certificate from the Justice in Sarah’s Bend, get it corrected by the Keepers in Mayfair."

      "We could," conceded Nan. "But the Bozes may well be watching for just that move. They'd put in a counter-claim, Apple would be seized as evidence and the whole thing would wind up in court, exactly where we don't want it."

      "The Bozes have more money than we do," agreed Eldest grimly.

      "And that's assuming whoever was holding him in evidence didn't decide they wanted some beautiful fire-haired daughters and disappear with him," commented Rose dryly.

      "Cedar-haired," corrected Eldest fondly, looking over at where he worked.

      "Mahogany," insisted Sarah.

      "I swear, it's brown until the sun hits it, *then* you see the red," opined Herra.

      "Brown, red, cedar or gold, he's beautiful," commented Catherine.

      "And ours," echoed Meg. "But how do we make him so in the eyes of the law?"

      Nan reflected. "There's a small Law library at Heron Landing. We've needed a run to the Landing for tools and parts anyway. Suppose Sarah and I make that run. Sarah," she nodded, "can shop while I read, and we can see what we can come up with."

      Nods around the table made that an easy decision. “That’s a plan. See if you can’t find us a way to marry him without a paper trail to Jonni Drover.”

      “Is all this secrecy really necessary?” asked May. “Surely the Bozes have bought another boy by now?”

      Herra snorted. “Like that would matter to Carol Boze. Besides, you’ve met the Bozes. Would you sell them a son or brother?”

      May frowned distastefully, remembering. “I guess not.”

      “About all they could get would be some used-up boy from the cribs, and even then, most governesses would rather overdose them than pass them on, and reckon it kinder. Besides, the Bozes have had two husbands already, and a family that’s had two husbands…”

      “…Won’t see a third,” finished Becca. “I hadn’t realized they’d had two.”

      “The first died of spring fever, not really their fault. They tried hushing up the second’s death, but it’s pretty clear he committed suicide and that’s always a black mark,” explained Eldest.

      “No wonder they were willing to kill to get Apple,” reflected May, understanding. “He was their last hope.”

      “Which they spoiled,” concluded Herra with satisfaction. “No marriage for them.”

      "Speaking of marriage,” Meg murmured, "how is that going to work?"

      "What do you mean?" asked Becca with a longing look at Apple where he worked by the wash-pump. "His birthday's coming soon."

      "Well… In an established family there's an order," Meg explained, a little awkwardly. "With us, well, what’s the order? Who goes first?"

      "What about oldest to youngest?" asked Herra. "It's traditional."

      "Which oldest?" asked Catherine. "Eldest is our head-of-family, but Rose is the actual Oldest."

      Rose shifted uncomfortably. "If anything, it should be opposite, youngest-to-oldest. My time's already past. I shouldn't even have a wedding night, a husband night for me is just wasted sauce. It makes no sense."

      “Youngest to oldest sounds good to me,” Sarah commented brightly.

      “Be careful what you wish for,” warned Herra. “Getting a baby out isn’t nearly as much fun as getting a baby in.”

      "I hear some young men, first blush, can do two or even three wives a night," put in Hope wistfully. "Not so long to wait."

      "I think stories like that are just that; stories," opined Nan. "Either that or an ad campaign by Everlast."

      "We are *not* drugging our own husband," Eldest told them firmly. "People make jokes about wives that need to do that."

      "That need to do what?" asked Apple, sweeping around the table to bestow a quick round of kisses.

      Lips still tingling and breathless, Eldest's flustered brain tried to think of something, anything, to redirect but Apple was becoming quite good at telling when someone was trying to put him off. Besides, the instinct of trying to shelter a boy from the mysteries of sex made little sense when said boy probably had more sexual experience than all his wives put together. Of course, her heart burned to contemplate that experience came from molestation and rape, but still.

      "We're just trying to figure out the order of the wedding nights," Becca told him, holding out a crooked finger and pursing her lips, fishing for a kiss.

Apple obliged, hooking his finger in hers. She reeled him in but after the kiss he shook his head. "I love you all, but you don't decide that. Order of nights is husband business."

      "Oh?" asked Herra with a smile. "What will the order be, then?"

      "Oldest to youngest. Except the first time, when Eldest will be first." He popped up to swoop around the table and hug Rose to soften the blow. "Sorry, Rose, but without Eldest I wouldn’t even be here; none of us would be here. Besides, she’s given me more apples than you have."

      Rose laughed, unoffended. "Are you saying our husband can be bribed with apples?"

      "Is there any other kind of husband?" he asked, puzzled.

      "We need to get that orchard planted, and soon," noted Rose somberly.

      "Rose was saying she shouldn't have a wedding night," Sarah told him.

      Apple looked down at Rose. "Truly?" he asked, hurt.

      Rose scowled at Sarah. "I didn't say that, I said a wedding night for me is wasted sauce. Which it is," she concluded matter-of-factly.

      "Husband nights are about more than just sauce," Apple told her. "I would never insist you take yours, but on nights you don't, I’ll be sleeping alone. You should take your night, though. Papa Bear told me wives that aren't loved grow spiteful and quarrelsome from neglect."

      “Spiteful and quarrelsome?" Rose asked, tasting the words. "Spiteful and quarrelsome,” she repeated, puzzled, before turning to their assembled company. “Am I spiteful and quarrelsome?”

      Chuckles sounded around the table.

      “For years,” Peony told her with a smile. “I thought it was just an older-sister thing, but now I’m not so sure. Take your husband night, Rose.”

      Rose nodded, leaning back into Apple’s arms. “Well… maybe just once, to see what it’s like,” she conceded.

      Eldest watched them, strangely apprehensive. On the one hand, she wished it was her with Apple's warm arms around her, and on the other hand… she was almost afraid of their coming nuptials. Everything was changing, so much so fast, and nothing was changing faster than Apple himself. Boys started growing later than girls, but they grew so fast when they did! Gone was the adorable waif Meg had frog-marched into her tent not two years ago.

      No one would mistake him for a girl now. His hair was still the same undisciplined mop, but longer, his shoulders broader, accentuating his narrow waist. Though Apple would never be a tall man he was already taller than his shorter wives and gaining on those of middling height, such as Eldest herself. Freed from having to pass as a girl he had tried letting his peach whiskers grow, but they were so downy and patchy he’d given up and shaved them, something Eldest was grateful for. The very day he’d joined the troop she’d wished him not to change, not knowing just how impossible that wish was. Once she’d thought of him almost as the daughter she’d never thought she’d have. It was strange and frightening to think that he’d soon be the husband she never thought she’d have. If only there was some way to stop the headlong rush, to catch her breath. Just a little time was all she wanted, time to grow used to the changes. But no, life rushed on, carrying her with it.

      And that, perhaps, was the meanest crux of her fear. Life. Three times she’d felt the whisper of life begin within her, only to have it cruelly wrenched away in blood and pain, leaving a horrible, horrible feeling of emptiness and loss. How could she ever face that again? True, she probably wouldn’t have to. Her woman’s courses still ran but lightly and spottily. Her chances had probably already passed. The thought was heartbreaking and yet almost a comfort. It had been horrible enough to lose the child of a stranger. What would it be like to have to face a treasured husband with the same news? A little time. That was all she wanted. A little time.

      Forever would be a good start.

Chapter Text

      Even with their light officer’s gig, Heron Landing was a full day’s ride away. So it was no surprise that Nan and Sarah didn’t return on the second day, or even the third. But when they hadn’t arrived back by midday on the fourth Eldest began to worry. Fortunately, they arrived that evening, before worry had set into full panic. She strode over to their makeshift stables to greet them, relief in her voice. “We were getting worried! Did everything go all right?”

      Nan gave her a broad smile. “Better than all right. The Picker’s mercantile were having a sale, we got the parts at ten percent discount.”

      “That is good news! Until the mill is finished and we actually start having an income every quince counts.”

      Nan nodded. “If you think that’s good news, wait until you hear the rest of it.”

      “Oh?”

      “Did we miss the supper?”

      Eldest shook her head. “Apple should be ringing the bell soon.”

      “Let me share it all at once, then.”

      In good weather the family had taken to eating in the open under the shade of a large oak, on long trestle tables set up for the purpose. They were missing the six who were at the mill site, but the other eight drifted in from various chores as the bell rang. Apple laid out fresh bread and a soup derived from an unlucky chicken who’d been found to be eating eggs instead of laying them. Together they dug in and for a time the clink of spoons on bowls and idle chatter filled the air. But as the meal came to an end Eldest pushed back her bowl and looked over to Nan and Sarah. 

      “So, what took you so long? I was about to send out riders to look for you.”

      Nan made a face. “Getting everything loaded took a bit, but mostly it was me,” she admitted. “Husbandry law is darn near as complicated as water law. Like anything else, possession is nine-tenths of it, but that last tenth gets *really* complicated. What’s needed is a real law-clerk, not a woman who plays at law like me. I wasn’t making any headway, but then that new lieutenant they have for the Queens Justice in Northaven stopped by to introduce herself. Do you remember Bounder, from the border campaign?”

      Eldest smiled, recalling the woman. “I do. And now that you put me in mind of it, yes, she was supposed to muster out into the Justice, Northaven first, then Heron Landing. I guess she made it!”

      Nan chuckled. “She did. She’s a very… direct woman, and I ended up telling her, in vague terms, about our problem. I hadn’t thought war-plunder would apply, since the Queens didn’t formally declare war, but she pointed me to an adjunction of the law, which defines war plunder as ‘any male taken as booty during war, rebellion or armed conflict in service of the Queens’. I think she’s assuming we found Apple as part of the booty from the Blackwood’s camp, and she’s not exactly wrong. Though he’d been with us the better part of a year, that is where we ‘found’ him, in a sense. The way Bounder sees it, the Blackwoods were in armed rebellion against the Queens and in any case it was an armed conflict, as attested by Princess Halley herself in our land grant. By her reading of the law that makes Apple war plunder pure and simple, no paper trail required. What’s more to the point, the person who will be making that judgement call is the Lieutenant-Magistrate for Northaven, and that just so happens to be Bounder. As Queen’s Justice she’ll have to interview him to be sure there’s no crossbreeding, but we already know that’s not an issue, and she hinted an invitation to the wedding wouldn’t be unwelcome.”

      Eldest laughed and there were pleased smiles around the table. “A good old-fashioned Ranger carouse might be just the thing to start the marriage off right.”

      “War plunder,” came Apple’s wistful voice from his place at the end of the table. “I always wondered what it would be like to be war plunder. It certainly sounds a lot more romantic than ‘I was scrounging for food and got caught.’”

      More laughter rolled down the table, but it was laughter of a pained and embarrassed sort. It was natural for women to bear the struggles and hardship of the world, but menfolk were to be protected. That a man, a boy no less, had ever had to go hungry, to scrounge like common river trash was deeply upsetting. 

      Without men, they were all barren spinsters, condemned to a world of empty wombs and silent nurseries. And a generation later, not even that much.

      Eldest swallowed a lump in her throat. “Heaven as my witness,” she promised thickly, “this family will keep you better than that.”

      There were murmured assents from around the table and Meg covered her face is rueful shame. “Apple, sweetie, if I had known you were a boy…”

      “Oh don’t you apologize for that,” he breathed. “Don’t you even think of apologizing. There’s many a thing I’d change in my life if I could, but meeting all of you, joining the 22nd, isn’t one of them. You… all of you… are the best thing that has ever happened to me.”

      “If you’ll recall,” Eldest reminded him dryly, “I *had* just ordered her to whip you.”

      Apple popped up to swoop around the table again, only to hug her this time. “Awww, you didn’t really mean it,” he told her fondly. “Even back then I could tell that. You’re a lot like Papa Bear, really. Gruff and growly on the outside, but inside you’re just a big softie.”

      Laughter filled the air and Eldest blushed in embarrassment. “Well, maybe,” she conceded, “but don’t go spreading it around outside the family. I have a reputation to uphold.”   

      “Family,” he repeated, eyes shining, still holding her from behind. “I like the sound of that.”

      More smiles flashed along the table, but then Sarah cleared her throat. “Speaking of family, parts for the mill weren’t the only thing we got at the mercantile.”

      “Oh?” asked Eldest, wondering, prepared to be severe. The family could not afford fripperies, not now.

      “I used my own crowns,” Sarah said defensively, catching Eldest’s look.

      Eldest checked her scowl. Sarah, alone of all their new-made sisters, had some of her own money to spend. That was the leftover of the suffering-price the Imomains had paid for the beating she had received at their hands. She’d donated most of it to the family coffers but had kept a small purse back, and no one would or could gainsay that. She’d paid for those coins with a gap-toothed smile and a nose that had not set precisely straight despite the medician’s best efforts. Not to mention a host of weather-wise aches and a limp when it was cold.

      “That’s different, then,” Eldest assured her. “What was it you got, though?”

      “Well,” she said with a coy smile to Apple, “The mercantile was having a sale. And I thought our future husband ought to look the part. So I couldn’t resist.” With that she brought out two packages wrapped in brown paper, tied with twine. Apple went to receive them, scolding her all the while.

      “You shouldn’t have!” he protested, “those coins were for you, you should have bought something nice for yourself.”

      Sarah favored him with a secret smile. “You know, I rather think I did.”

      Puzzled, he began unwrapping the packages, then as the first peeked open he looked it over and blushed the most adorable shade of red, clutching it tight to his chest as the family eagerly leaned forward to see. “That… that’s for the wedding,” he told them firmly, re-wrapping and setting it aside to a chorus of “Awws”.

      “Try the other,” encouraged Sarah, and the rest of the table took up the chant, while Apple fumbled with the wrapping.

      This time the garments tumbled to the table in a flash of blue and green and white lace, all jumbled together. If he could have blushed a deeper shade of red he would have, but at their encouragement he held them up, a pretty kilt of green and blue tartan threaded with red, and a delicate tunic of white with see-through lace panel trim. 

      “Well?” asked Eldest, grinning. “Go try them on, love, see if they fit.”

      Still blushing, he retreated to the carriage barn that served as his husband quarters, emerging a shyly a few minutes later, smoothing down the kilt and straightening the collar of the tunic. Eldest involuntarily inhaled along with the rest of the table. Though Apple no longer had to pass as a girl, he still dressed like one; mostly because those were all the clothes they had for him. It was a shock to see him dressed as a boy, pretty, shy, and vulnerable. The kilt was, in truth, a little large for him, coming a bit below his knee, but together with the polished riding boots he wore it displayed his fetching legs to best advantage, accentuating the strength of his calves and the lean, striated muscle that all but shouted his maleness at them. The kilt, of course, teased his tight bottom, narrow waist and hips, all while promising easy access to his body. The white tunic did the same for his chest, flaunting his broad, square shoulders while the lace panels, picked in delicate, masculine designs of flowers and birds displayed his pale peaches-and-cream skin to best advantage. Somehow the ensemble teased both virginity and virility, and the effect was simply stunning.

      “Turn around, Apple honey, let’s see all of it”, Sarah insisted.

      Still blushing, Apple did a pirouette, gracing them with a swish of tartan pleats and a flash of muscular thighs as he did so.

      “Have him bound and washed, and sent to my tent,” whispered Bea, out of Apple’s hearing.

      “I’ll skip the washing,” whispered Herra back.

      “My womb just called,” Peony murmured. “It’s wanting twins now.”

      It was Meg that brought them back down to earth with a rueful shake of her head. “It’s lovely, but how are we supposed to keep our hands off him another six more weeks when he’s dressed like *that*?

      With some difficulty Eldest forced herself to agree. “Apple, love, it’s beautiful, but let’s save that one for the wedding too.”

      “Awww…” came the chorus of disappointment, but Apple scooted off, embarrassed and relieved, and hurried back to his quarters to change.

      “Six more weeks,” Eldest told them sternly, while he was gone. “A month and a half. Or we’re no better than the Bozes.”

      There were grumbles, but no real protests. Except for Sarah, they’d all met the Bozes and knew what they were being compared with. “Six more weeks,” she repeated. “Make do with kisses until then.”

      “Six more weeks for some of us,” commented Sarah with a sigh. “Eight weeks for others.”

      “The numbers are what they are, youngest… but knowing Apple, I think he’ll find a way to make it up to you.”

      Sarah perked up. “Do you really think so?”

      “You ought to know him well enough by now. What do you think? And oh, good catch, on the clothes. When I have a purse of my own to spend, you’ll have to let me split the cost with you."

      Murmured assents echoed down the table. “But what was in the other package?” asked Becca plaintively.

      Sarah gave them all a wicked smile. "That’s for me to know, and you to discover. On your wedding nights, I’m sure.”

      “Eeeeeeee…” came the squeals, before Eldest rapped her knuckles on the table for attention. “Focus, ladies, focus. The Carver and Greyluck families will be here in two days, to begin the rebuild of the Manor. We’ll need to move Apple to the mill while that’s going on, to keep him safe. Both families have good reputations and the Carvers already have a husband. But the Greylucks are a young, split off family, only just beginning to save for theirs. Let’s not give them more temptation than they can handle.”

      “Especially temptation like *that*,” agreed Bea.

      “Amen.”

      “So, Apple is moved tomorrow. I hope I don’t need to tell you I want tight nerves and ready weapons. The Blackwoods were neither the first nor last bandits to infest these woods. To a childless family, he’s literally priceless.”

      “Like ours,” croaked Whisper with a smile.

Chapter Text

      As it happened, all their careful planning was for naught. Eldest would have preferred their contractors not know about Apple at all, spiriting him away to the newly-built mill while the masons and carpenters rebuilt the ancient manor. Ealdwina Greyluck spoiled that plan by arriving a day early, in advance of the rest of her family, so that she could do a final assessment of the job and thus direct her women the most efficiently. She and two sisters arrived just as Apple was serving breakfast, so there was nothing for it but to invite them to sit and join in.

      After a meal of Apple’s ham, buttered eggs, biscuits and fruit cobbler, together with being served by ‘the prettiest set o’ trousers she’d ever laid eyes on,’ Ealdwina promptly offered to cut their promised price by a third, in return for ‘breeding rights on the boy.’ That was politely but firmly declined. She then offered to go down to half, but there was a sparkle in her eye that took the sting out of the trespass and Eldest found herself taking a liking to the woman. They settled on Ealdwina and her sisters repointing and restoring the main barn as well as the manor, all in return for Apple’s home cooking, a dance and a kiss for each Greyluck sister at the wedding.

      Though it wasn’t what Eldest had planned, she had to admit it worked out well in the end. When the Carvers arrived the sight of a boy seemed to reassure them, and within a week they’d sent for their own husband and little ones to join them on site. Apple was ecstatic; he hadn’t been able to talk to someone of his own sex since he’d worked for the Sibleys and he and Jordan Carver got along quite well. With the menfolk taking care of the domestic tasks and small packs of children running around, the hill had a wonderful domestic air that Eldest hoped was a presage of good times to come.

      Meanwhile, the antique manor rapidly took shape under the expert labor of the carpenters and masons, re-roofed and weather tight once more.

      Though the interior would take considerable time to finish, the Carvers focused first on the husband’s quarters and the nursery. Once those were done Apple and Jordan moved in with the Carver littles, even though much of the rest was incomplete. Things were going so swimmingly, and the days so full that it was almost a shock to realize Apple’s birthday had crept up to only a few weeks away. That forced the issue; the steps they had to take to make it legal could not be put off any longer.

Chapter Text

      Despite the assurance of a friendly magistrate in Bounder, arranging the marriage took a surprising amount of rigamarole. Nan’s research had included just what paperwork would be necessary. It was dismaying to find that despite the fact that he was war plunder Apple would still be subject to the same interview, inspection and sample analysis as any other groom.

      Interview and inspection were ancient customs but sample analysis was new, when hints in old texts led to the invention of the microscope. The idea was to give women a better idea of what they were buying, and of course, to prevent the tragedy of gibs -sterile men- such as had led to the war of the False Eldest. It made sense but it seemed vaguely obscene in some way, and from what Eldest had heard the Church was far from being onboard with it. It was unlucky enough to speak of a child before it was born. Wasn’t inspecting a boy’s seed before a marriage equally so? As a family they hemmed and hawed over it, but law was clear. Besides, she had promised Apple that they would have him looked at by a proper medician before the marriage. So in the end there was nothing for it but to pack Apple up and take him to be examined. Northaven was too small to boast a medician family capable of doing the exam, so they arranged to meet Bounder in the larger river town of Heron Landing, where she had other business.

      The ride to Heron Landing hadn’t been pleasant. Eldest had once ridden guard on the pay chests of the old 9^th Brigade, three month’s pay for over two thousand women, one of a whole column of guards, eagle-eyed and sharp witted. The experience served her in good stead but no amount of gold was ever as precious as the treasure they guarded now. She rode in the gig with Apple, trying to relax and failing miserably, while her new-made sisters rode on the wings. Logically she knew the road was clear and the others would spot any threat long before it became a danger. Nevertheless, she found herself startling at every bump and jolt, imagining packs of husband raiders galloping down at them, intent on stealing their future. She had never liked to hear the excuse of “They have men to protect”; until she had one to protect. Now she suddenly understood the short tempers, darting eyes and hair-trigger reflexes. So the resulting trip was nerve-wracking, made worse by Apple sulking beside her. He’d been planning on wearing his work clothes to town, used to the freedom of his life passing as a girl and he chafed at the new restrictions. He’d accepted the plain brown walking robe they’d purchased for him readily enough, but had turned mulish when asked to wear a veil.

      “Papa Bear never wore a veil, not a day in his life,” he told her petulantly.

      “Correct me if I’m wrong, but your Papa Bear had thirty wives and a small army of daughters to protect him. And I’ve always gotten the impression that he was a good deal less portable than you are.”

      “Well, that’s a truth,” he conceded grudgingly, unconsciously slipping into the plains-brogue of his younger days. “Papa Bear once grabbed himself a fence post and all us youngin’s together couldn’t pull him off. But I always wanted to be like one of those Marisburg boys what smiled at folk, like Catherine tol’ us about.”

      “One, you are not the only one in the family that tells tall tales. Two, are you trying to start a riot? Apple, most women won’t see more than a handful of men in their entire lives. To them any man with both eyes and sound teeth is a handsome man, and they react accordingly. What do you think they’ll do at the sight of you? We’d have to shoot the first three just to show the rest we mean business! Do you want that on your soul?”

      “And to think you accuse me of exaggerating things,” came the peevish reply.

      She drew a hot breath to scold some sense into him, but checked herself. This wasn’t like him. “Apple, what’s wrong?” she asked gently.

      He gazed at her a long few moments, then sighed and looked down. “We’re taking me to be tested.”

      “Of course, honey. It’s just a formality. It won’t hurt, I promise.”

      “What if it’s not just a formality?” he asked, staring at his feet. “What if I’m *not* clean, what if I’m *not* fertile, what if I’m a… a gib like Prince Michael was? A man is only worth what he can put in a cradle. If I can’t do that, you’ll… you’ll have to sell me for a bedding boy or if I’m infected they’ll send me to a lazar-house and I’ll never see any of you again!”

      Eldest stared. Boys were such treasures, always cosseted, protected and loved, because they promised fertility. She had never before considered the burden such expectations laid on them. What would it be for a boy to contemplate being barren and useless? She couldn’t count the number of times she’s heard of men committing suicide. Perhaps not all of them were due to cruelty and abuse, as she’d supposed. Perhaps it was the expectations of society itself that were more at fault. So she couldn’t just dismiss his fears; they were well-founded.

      She took a long deep breath, gathering her thoughts.

      “Beloved,” she began slowly, “I don’t believe the gods have guided us this far only to abandon us at the end. You are clean, you are beautiful, and I worry far more about our fertility than yours. Now, I don’t know the future. But I can promise you, you are not just a pretty face to us. Hell, most of us owe you our lives, and not just Peony. Even if all you can be is a bedding boy, you’re going to be *our* bedding boy. This family will not give you up.”

      “You’ll have to,” he replied bleakly. “You’ll have to. To afford a *real* husband you’ll have to sell me to some rich family…”

      “Apple, shhh. This is the beginning of our story, not the end. Trust me.”

      He stared at her long moments, lips parted and eyes swimming with tears, before burying his face in her shoulder. “I’m sorry, I know I’m just being a silly boy. But even before the Bozes took me, when my mama was still alive, it seemed like we could never get ahead. We never had much but each other, but Mamma was getting older and plains life was getting so hard on her. I was getting older, and we both knew I wouldn’t pass forever. We were always living in fear, always looking over our shoulders. It always seemed that any time things got even a little better, it just meant something worse was waiting around the corner.”

      “Not this time,” she swore, holding him close. “Gods as my witness, not this time.”

Chapter Text

      In the end they’d compromised that he’d go unveiled for the trip, but veil when they got to the town. So as the steeples of Heron landing came into view Apple sighed, put on a broad-brimmed travelling hat, and tugged the lace veil down without protest, giving Eldest’s hand a squeeze as the family closed up, around and behind them as they entered the town traffic.

      Their first stop was the doctor’s office, a medician family with the appropriate name of Comfort, who had a charming little practice just off the main street, not far from the famous Picker’s Mercantile. Most of the family stood guard outside while Eldest and Meg took Apple in. There they were greeted by the eldest Comfort sister, a plump, merry woman who did her best to set them at ease. “Just inspection and analysis today, yes?” she inquired.

      “If you please,” agreed Eldest.

      It was embarrassing, especially for Apple as he was asked an increasingly personal set of questions and then made to submit to a special, stirruped chair to be examined. A bit of his blood was drawn and whisked off by a younger Comfort sister while the Eldest showed them a small, windowless room which was the sample room, lit by a golden oil lamp.

      Suspicious, Eldest searched thoroughly but there were no windows, no hidden doors, just a small slot for the sample when Apple was done. Clearly, there was no way for him to be stolen while they waited. A small cup and a bottle of lotion were in evidence, along with a modest array of naughty tintypes discretely peeking out under a towel.

      Eldest Comfort gave an embarrassed smile at that discovery. “Some boys require a little… inspiration,” she explained awkwardly before turning to Apple. “Just fill the cup, honey, and pass it through the slot at the end,” she told him as he blushed the reddest Eldest had ever seen. Still blushing, he had shooed them out to wait.

      The wait was longer than Eldest would have expected from her crib visits, but Eldest Comfort seemed pleased by it. “Not too quick, not too long, always a good sign,” she chirped, taking the sample in hand to a back room while a younger daughter brought them snacks and a little wine to pass the time as her mothers and grandmothers did their lab work.

      Finally Eldest Comfort came back, a puzzled look to her face. “Eldest Forester, are you planning to spend the night in Heron Landing?”

      “We are. Our home is a day’s ride away.”

      “Would you be willing to bring your groom back for a second sample tomorrow morning?”

      A chill fist seemed to grip her heart, and Apple’s face filled with dread. “Is there a problem?”

      “No. Well… no, it’s just that…”

      “Just that… What?” Eldest demanded.

      “Well, his counts are unusually good. These are more in line of what I’d expect of a male of good breeding, family breeding, than one crib-sired. Sometimes, though, if the male hasn’t been, ah, relieved, in a while it can cause an artificially high result, so if you wouldn’t mind-”

      "I’m afraid we do,” Eldest responded evenly. The last thing they needed was someone getting a closer look at Apple, or asking too many questions. “We have very limited time here and we must use it wisely.”

      The doctor drew breath, perhaps to argue, but a scowl from Meg seemed to nip that in the bud. “Very well, she concluded, disappointed. “You’ll be pleased to know that the rest of the tests are all negative. Your groom seems healthy and clean. Of course,” she warned, “we can’t detect syphilis yet, not even by microscope. It hides itself somehow. But syphilis would certainly have presented by now and there’s no sign of it.”

      Eldest breathed a long sigh of relief she hadn’t even realized she was holding and Apple almost wilted in relief. That settled, getting the marriage papers initialed took only a few minutes and they were on their way.

      As they exited the building though, Meg was still scowling. “What do you suppose that was about? Do you think she wanted the extra sample for a turkey baster?”

      Eldest thought on it and shrugged. “Probably no more than what she said. Unlawful insemination doesn’t work, everyone knows that. The returns are a fraction of live cover, and even if you do get a baby out of it, there’s usually something wrong with it.”

      “I don’t know. Every few years it seems there’s some boffin who says that this time, if she does this, this and that, it will work.”

      “And those are the ones that keep the priestesses in kindling,” returned Eldest dryly, “assuming an angry mob doesn’t get them first. Now where do you suppose the Justice Garrison would be?”

~Meanwhile~

      Bettina Comfort carefully crawled inch by inch out of the hot, dusty garret crawlspace, careful not to make a sound that might be heard by those below.

      “Well? Did you see?” whispered her sister Dale when she fully emerged.

      “The knot hole’s too small! I could barely see anything,” she whispered back. “He was facing away for most of it.”

      “But you saw him naked, right?”

      Bettina blushed. “Yes. He’s dreamy. But… how are you supposed to mount *that*? It looks like it would hurt!”

      “Only the first time, Zara Treesdale says. After that she says it hurts so good!”

      “Dee says Zara Treesdale is a whoremonger who chases it raw in the cribs. She’ll get into trouble one day.”

      Dale sighed. “I wish he was ours. Do you think we might be able to get him?”

      “I wish we could. I bet he would come willingly. His new wives are cruel!”

      Her older sister startled. “Cruel? What makes you think that?”

      “Didn’t you see his shoulder? They branded him, poor thing, just like in the olden days.”

      “I didn’t see. What did it look like?”

      Bettina pictured it in her mind’s eye. “It didn’t look familiar. Like... a spikey B? I didn’t get the best look, but I’m sure I’d recognize it if I saw it again.”

      “It doesn’t matter. The age of husband raiding is over and his new wives look too dangerous to cross anyway.”

      “So how are we supposed to get a husband then?”

      “Pray that one of our mothers gives us a brother,” Dale told her glumly. “And save every last quince in case they don’t.”

Chapter Text

      It took them three tries and the patience of a local resident before they found the Justice Garrison, a surprisingly dilapidated structure hedged in by a town that had outgrown it. There they were met by Bounder and she took them inside, past yard walls of stone-and-cob that were literally falling apart. It looked like they weren’t even trying to repair them, just carting them away as rubble and replacing them with a cheap wooden palisade.

      “This place could use a better Quartermaster,” Eldest couldn’t help murmuring.

      Bounder scowled in agreement. “Just between the two of us, this place needs a good deal more than that. The Lieutenant here’s a short-timer and has stopped caring. I have to finish my rookie hitch in Northaven though, before I can apply.”

      Bounder settled them in an interior room and brought out a few simple forms and a fountain pen. After reciting the usual formulaic oaths she turned to Eldest, “Eldest Forester, may I address your groom face to face?”

      “Of course. Apple, honey, this is Justice Bounder, please answer any questions she may have.”

      Apple gratefully set aside his hat and veil, shaking his hair out of his eyes with a smile. “Pleased to meet you,” he greeted her politely, then blushed adorably as she stared.

      “*This* is your forest stray?”

      “This is the one.”

      “Throw away something you value, Eldest. Throw away a lot of something you value. The gods get jealous of luck like this. I followed the drum twenty-five years, and what did I find? Rattlesnakes, scorpions and armadillos, that’s what.” After a long, lingering gaze at Apple, she turned back to her forms, writing in information as Eldest supplied it. Finally she turned again to Apple.

      “Let’s see… Apple, to the best of your knowledge and belief, are you or any of your affianced wives closer in blood than three degrees of kinship in the family line, nor two in any related line?”

      “Gosh, no,” he replied, wide-eyed and innocent.

      “That’s that, then. Thank you, dear.”

      Meg took Apple out while Bounder finished the forms. “That’s it, that’s the interview?” Eldest asked, incredulous.

      Bounder gave her a crooked grin. “Does there need to be anything more? There’s no way that shy beauty is any relation to you and yours, any fool can see that. I mean, just look at your ugly mugs!”

      Eldest chuckled. “Thank you, Bounder.”

      “Anything for a fellow Ranger.”

      “You and your girls coming to the wedding?”

      “Wouldn’t miss it!” Bounder carefully pressed the seal of her office to the papers and handed over the top sheet, crisp and official. Eldest gave it a quick once-over. It declared than the fourteen Forester sisters married one Apple, pedigree lines waived as the groom was war plunder and verbal questioning indicated no crossbreeding.

      “It’s not legal until the notary clerk countersigns and files it,” Bounder warned.

      “That’s our next stop, tomorrow,” Eldest promised. “See you at the wedding!”

Chapter Text

      As a child of the Sword and of the Army, Eldest had never been to a wedding. She had only the vaguest idea of what went on at one, other than there was a party, you knelt before a priestess and kissed a boy. That wasn’t too far off from the truth, either, at least for modern Queensland weddings.

      Unfortunately, their groom was plains-bred and had very specific ideas of what made a good wedding. Apparently on the plains women were still required to actually *catch* their husbands and that was where things started to go sideways. At first it had seemed a charming game and no great burden. It was fourteen to one, after all, and though Apple had caught up with or passed most of his wives in height they still had a few with longer strides. With such advantages, how hard could it be?

      They soon found out. Those narrow hips and lean legs were good for more than just temping women into indiscretions. The wedding guests -the Carvers, Greylucks, Bounder and her women- lined the edges of the lower fields to shout encouragement and good-natured ribbings while Apple took off over the same fields he’d once dodged bullets on. And just like then he was absurdly fast. They tried herding him to a corner and trapping him there. He found a gap and sprinted through. They tried to sweep him up in a line and he ran around them. Whisper actually caught ahold of his arm once only to discover he’d coated himself in a light layer of goose grease, making him impossible to hold. After hours of trying to catch him they were all blown and sweating despite the cool fall air and Eldest found herself gasping for breath in the long grass beside Meg, wheezing like a horse ridden too far and too hard. Apple was tantalizingly close, but far out of reach, with the most ridiculous grin on his face.

      “Apple, how long does this go on?” she called desperately.

      “Why, ‘till you catch me of course!” came the all-too-cheerful reply. “Papa Bear’s wives had to chase him two days before they finally cornered him. I wouldn’t want you to think I’m easy!”

      “Why did we want a husband, again?” gasped Meg beside her.

      “I think it had something to do with sex and babies,” she wheezed back, trying to catch her breath.

      “You know, celibacy and dying alone and uncared for in a back alley is sounding awfully good right about now.”

      “Not to me.” Eldest heaved herself up. “Keep him busy. I’ll be back.”

      “Where are you going?”

      “I need to get something.”

      “You’re not thinking of cheating are you?”

      “It’s not cheating, it’s just being smarter than the boy.”

      Meg staggered to her feet. “I knew there was a reason we made you Eldest. Go, we’ll keep him occupied somehow.”

      It didn’t take long to fetch Sterling and a lasso, and after that it was a simple matter of running him down and a quick flip of the rope. The family happily piled on after that that. Together they trussed him up and stuffed a gag in his mouth to muffle his indignant protests. Then they threw him over Sterling’s back like a sack of grain and hauled him back to the manor amid the cheers and ribald encouragements of their guests. The vengeful spanks they applied to his bottom along the way were all the sweeter for being completely unnecessary.

      While Apple bathed and made himself pretty she and the others cleaned up as best they could, changing to fresh clothes and waiting impatiently until a youngest Carver came to fetch Bounder. Normally a boy’s sister or mother would give him away, but Apple had neither so it seemed fitting to ask Bounder, as a representative of the Queens, to step in. The Queens were the mothers of the country, after all.

      Off went Bounder with a grin while everyone else gathered at the altar and heaven’s arch that the Carvers had generously made for the ceremony. There the two wings of the family lined up on either side with the priestess in the middle. They didn’t have to wait long. Soon Bounder approached, leading Apple by a silken rope tied around his wrists. Eldest inhaled along with every other woman there. He was wearing the kilt and lace tunic Sarah had gotten him, a crown of flowers and ribbons braided in his hair, a vision of delicate masculinity. He was radiant as Eldest came to greet them, and Bounder passed the lead to her.

      “Eldest Forester,” she intoned, “In the name of the Queens I pass the ownership of this man to you and your family. Keep and care for him well.”

      “We shall,” she promised, eyes shining. She passed his lead off to Sarah, and she gave him her ring, passing in turn to each wife and gathering their wedding rings until Rose handed him back to Eldest. Hurriedly she untied him and offered him her arm. “No hard feelings, I hope?” she whispered. “People were starting to get hungry.”

      “Naw,” he whispered back with a grin. “Papa Bear’s senior wife Chieftess Haliwha did the same thing, though it took her two days to work ‘round to it on account of the plainswomen bein’ so powerful stubborn. If she hadn’t they’d probably still be chasin’ him across those plains. He always said that was when he knew they’d be good mammas for his children. Strong and stubborn enough to give it a good try and smart enough to cheat when they needed to. You didn’t even take a day to get to the same place, so our little ones ought to be tough as badgers and sharp as tacks!”

      With that the priestess called them to the altar and together they reported their marriage to the gods, and received their blessings in return. She slipped Apple’s ring around his finger and he returned hers, sealing the gift with a kiss, going down the line of his wives, returning each ring with a kiss.

      Together they all held hands while the guests cheered, showering them with wheat groats while she could scarce believe it had happened. Though Apple had technically been theirs since the marriage license was filed in Northaven, it hadn’t truly hit home that they were married until now, when they were joined in the sight of the gods as well as the law. Wiping tears away they descended as a group to the waiting feast tables.

      At the tables Jordan Carver directed a small army of wives, daughters and well-wishers to bring out the meal. Little of it was fancy, just hearty fare. Breads, soups, potatoes, roast chicken and a roast pig made up the bulk of the menu, along with a cask of fine wine and few of hard cider. The firkin of whiskey would come out later as the evening wore on and the Carver littles were put to bed. Apple was seated at the head of the table, Eldest on his right, Sarah on his left and after the quick blessing everyone dug in.

      Her head was awhirl the rest of the evening. Apple shifted places often to dine with each of his wives, then as darkness fell and lanterns were lit the entire party went to the dancing squares. Fifes, dulcimers, banjos and even Apple’s bugle came out, and under a jewel-cask of stars they danced. Her pledge to the Greylucks was redeemed as under her watchful eyes Apple danced with each girl in turn, some of them trembling as they touched a man who was not their father for the first time and a few even crying as they received their first kiss. By way of compensation she and the others got to dance with Jordan Carver. She had always thought that it was cruel the way families blessed with menfolk trotted them out at social events, almost as if they were taunting those without. Now though, seeing it from the other side, she understood it. It was important that women knew that such wonderful creatures existed, and that they were worth striving for.

      Finally, as the evening grew late and girls without a man to bed were casting long looks at each other, Apple whirled in from the dancing square and fetched up beside her.

      “I think that’s enough dancing for now,” he hinted, casting her a long look of his own. “I ought to go check the fire in the husband’s quarters. I shouldn’t wonder if it’s gone cold, and then what sort of husband would I be?”

      Off he went while Eldest took a large swallow of wine for nerves and courage. Minutes had never passed so slowly as she waited, giving him time to settle himself before she herself rose, legs trembling, to follow.

Chapter Text

      Eldest exhaled, the breath taken away from her. Apple waited for her, curled up couchant like a noble stag. He was clad only in a long husband's robe of sheer white lace, artfully arranged on the soft hunter-green coverlet of the large bed. The lace teased and revealed the beautiful trim lines of his body, so alike and yet so different from the softer, more practical curves of a woman. His peaches-and cream complexion glowed in the golden candle light, and he seemed like something out of a fairy tale, too beautiful and ephemeral to be real.

      "I don't know if I should be here," she breathed, enthralled.

      "Whyever not?" he asked, with an adorable toss of his head, his hair lengthening into the rich, erotic mane that was a man's birthright.

      "You look like a prince worthy of the Queens," she breathed, "And I'm just an aging common line soldier."

      He shook his head. "I'm the stray orphan of a dead family that was only a step above the plains trash. Without you I would be a drugged zombie in a crib, or dangling dead from a tree." He patted the bed beside him. "Where else should a woman be, on her wedding night, than with her husband?"

      Of its own volition her body moved to be closer to him, and she sat beside him, but she still didn't dare touch him. "You deserve better than I can give you," she breathed, still not daring to believe that the moment was real, that he was real. “You deserve better than any of us can give you.”

      He gave her a shy smile and pursed his lips, considering. "Do you know why I came back to be a drummer in your troop?" He asked softly.

      "No. I've often wondered."

      "I always knew I wouldn't be able to pass as a girl forever. My whiskers would start to grow eventually, after all. I'm kind of surprised I managed to pass as long as I did. I knew I'd be found out. I was tired of running, tired of being cold and hungry, tired of hating my life. When I met you, I knew that you were kind, and that you hated the Bozes. That was the moment I knew I wanted to belong to a woman Just. Like. That. And now I do. And I want to make you as happy as you've made me." His arms reached out to hold her, to stroke her hair. She leaned into his touch, her hands spasming with the need to hold him, take him, to mount that beautiful young body and make him her own, but she held them still.

      "I... I actually don't know what to do with a boy who isn't, you know... chained and drugged," she admitted, ashamed.

      "Well," he gave her a beautiful, mischievous smile. "I'm pretty sure it starts with kissing."

      Oh, it started with kissing all right. Fearful, tentative, then hot and passionate, his scent like cinnamon, his skin samite and velvet all wrapped up in roses, his hair like silk through her fingers, his touches shy but intimate, discovering mysteries she didn't even know her body had. Surprisingly to her, their coupling was almost an afterthought, and only after he'd wrenched ecstasies from her, leaving her trembling and breathless.

      "Where on earth did you learn that?" she asked, when she could form words again.

      He ducked his head shyly. "Sophonsiba Boze gave me a book on K'lamour. The Bozes weren't readers, it was the only book I had, there. I read it a lot."

      Eldest stiffened. "She's the one who hurt you, wasn't she?" she asked softly.

      "She wasn't the only one, but it's true Sophonsiba could be a mean drunk. If I didn't... you know... make her happy, she'd slap me or spank me or pinch me. When she wasn't drunk, though, she was one of the nicer ones." He reflected on that. "I think that's why she had to get drunk on her night. I think she felt sorry for me. I think she knew what they done was wrong, but she couldn't stand up to her sister." He shuddered at the memory. "No one could."

      Eldest grimaced, remembering the woman. The last thing she wanted to do on her wedding night was discuss the Bozes, but Apple seemed to need to talk about it. "Did you ever sire a child on any of them?" she asked.

      He shook his head. "Not insofar as I know. That’s part of why I was so scared, that trip to the Doctor’s. I guess my body wasn’t... ready, then. Also," he blushed. "I'd, you know... pretend... I'd finished, but I wouldn't really."

      Eldest puffed out a laugh of admiration. "Did you really?"

      He nodded. "I knew it was wrong, a sin according to the holy book, but I hated them. I didn't want to have to love their babies."

      “You don’t have to love babies got from you by rape.”

      “A man does,” Apple corrected somberly. “A man may not love his wives, but his children are gifts from the gods. He should always love and cherish them, no matter how he came by them; he shouldn't hold them responsible for their mother's misdeeds."

      A pang went through Eldest. Women and their ambitions ruled the world, but far too often it was the gentle menfolk and their children who paid the price for female greed and arrogance. Guiltily her eyes went to the brand on his left shoulder. Proof, if any was needed, just how cruel women could be.

      Gently she touched the horrific thing, the harsh, angular “B” taking up the whole of his shoulder. “Please tell me they gave you laudanum, or something…”

      “No,” he said simply. “After… after I was caught the third time they hauled me into the barn. I saw the iron heating in the coals and I knew what they was gonna do. I tried to get away, but Heddie and Mazie held me down while that Carol Boze was screaming at me, that she’d teach me a lesson I’d never forget.”

      Lying there in the darkness, she heard echoes of the years-ago pain, fear and desperation in his voice.

      “She wasn’t wrong, neither,” he went on. “I remember it all. How much it hurt, but mostly I remember the smell. It was horrible.”

      With sudden resolve she kissed him and slipped out of bed, starting to dress.  

      “Where are you going?” he wondered.

      “Westcountry,” she told him, voice thick with rage. “I need to empty a couple revolvers worth of lead into Carol Boze.”

      “Don’t you dare.” One strong arm encircled her waist, pulling her back to bed. Not for the first time she wondered at the odd juxtaposition. Everyone thought of men as the weaker sex, and they were, struggling to survive even in the womb. Yet once they made it into the world, pound for pound they were physically stronger than women. She found herself beneath him, his lips desperately kissing hers, driving all thoughts of vengeance away as her body responded to his.

      “Don’t you dare,” he repeated, murmuring. “The Bozes are dead to me. Whatever justice is owed to them, for my mamma, for what they did to me, the gods will take for me. My revenge on them is to be the best, most loving husband I can be. I want to give this family willingly everything they tried to take by force. We’ll have dozens of beautiful children and not a one of them will carry the name of Boze.”

      As a distraction it certainly worked, their bodies merging once more, to her surprise and delight. “If that’s the way you wish it, husband, I’ll honor that wish,” she murmured, stroking the wonderful softness of his hair, his head pillowed on her shoulder while their bodies danced a slow dance of pleasure. “But- I’d not share that memory with the others. If you did, it would get back to Nan or Herra, and then that Boze will end up in a pine box, no matter what you say.”

      “Nan or Herra?”

      “Nan has a strong sense of justice and a hot temper. Herra’s just very traditional. If you harm her man, she’ll kill you. If she heard that tale, not even I as eldest could stop her.”

      “They’ll see the brand,” he worried. “Those that haven’t seen it already.”

      “They will. I’d just go a little vague on the details.”

      “I can’t lie to my wives,” he told her earnestly. “Lying’s a sin.”

      She laughed at the idea and drew breath to confront him with all his sins of the past, then came to the odd realization that she couldn’t think of one. He’d frequently stretched the truth beyond all recognition, but as far as outright lies…

      “You told us you were a plainsgirl,” she complained, finally thinking of one. “That was a lie.”

      “I *am* a plainsgirl,” he told her playfully, with a kiss. “I have a birth certificate that says so.”

      Trapped, she gave a chuckle. “I suppose that’s the truth. And nothing much but the truth. All that time I thought you were made of tall tales and boasting, but it was all true, wasn't it? The letter of it, anyway."

      "Lying is a sin," he told her mischievously. "But misdirecting folk is fun."

      She thought further. “You lied about your name. It’s Jonni, and you told us it was Apple.”

      “I did not! Plainsfolk won’t lie about names. On the plains we’re too close to the sky, too close to the gods, to lie about things like that. Your soul wanders in dreams. If you change your name your soul won’t be able to find its way back.”

      “Oh?” If there was one thing she had learned about him it was that he took the superstitions of the plains very seriously. “What happens then?” she asked, curious.

      “At best you become a different person. At worst you become a Chidi, a soulless monster. No. No one from the plains will lie about a name.”

      “Then how is Apple your name?”

      He snuggled closer to her. “You can have more than one name,” he said softly. “Most people do. It was my mamma that gave me that name, and your mamma’s got a right to name you. You don’t get many apples on the plains, you really don’t. But whenever she could afford one, she’d buy one and give it to me as a treat. I’d always cut it exactly in two, so she could have half, but she’d always refuse, and ask me to eat her share. She said that was my apple, but I was her Apple. She’d watch me eat it, smiling the whole time.”

      Her breast was damp from tears and she held him close, a long time laying together, stroking his hair. "You know," she said softly. "All that time when you were a drummergirl I wondered what it was the Bozes had stolen from your mother and it was in front of me the whole time. What they stole from her was you."

      Apple nodded somberly. "I tried to be content with the wives the fates had given me, like the Holy Book says a good man should. But when I realized I was stolen, and they'd killed my mamma to do it, that's when I started running away. They had no right to me; I didn't belong to them."

      "No," she told him firmly. "You belong to us."

      “Yes,” he snuggled close. “My mamma always said, ‘if you remember the gods, the gods will remember you.’ It seems they did, in the end. And they were kind to me.”

      “And to us,” she whispered in the darkness, the warm glow of Apple’s passion still suffusing her, the liquid feel of his seed within her. There really wasn’t much hope, she supposed, but still she wished it to take root, grow and blossom. At her age blood and emptiness were by far the most likely result, but she wasn’t alone anymore. She had a husband and family to share the joys and sorrows with.

Chapter Text

~ Five Years Later ~

      Eldest guided Jasper down the sun-dappled forest track, wending her way back up to what the latest maps were calling Forester Hill. The hill had been cleared of the trees that had been there when the Blackwoods ruled it, cleared for pasture and an apple orchard on the south-facing slope. Atop the hill was their Forester Hall. Part farmhouse, part fortress, the Carvers and Greylucks had outdone themselves in restoring both it and the stout barn and outbuildings that accompanied it. That had been expensive. But it had been worth every quince too. Large, well-built, with room for every sister, a spacious husband’s quarters and an even bigger nursery. It even had the latest technology: running water and indoor privies.

      Riding up to the main gate she acknowledged Becca’s shouted challenge with a wave of her arm and the day’s password, then waited while the gate was unbarred, letting her trot up to the barn. Heart lifting, she unsaddled Jasper and turned him into his stall before striding up to the house. As usual the house smelled richly of prairie stew and baking bread. She gave a wry smile. Apple still tended to cook as though he was feeding cowpunchers out of a chuck wagon. The cookbook they’d gotten him helped, but when push came to shove he still fell back on what he was familiar with. At least they’d managed to teach him which spices went with which, his bread was as heavenly as ever, and thank all the gods and the Mothers too, firebush didn't grow this far east. Smiling, she stepped into the kitchen.

      “Oh, thank Hera you’re here!” he exclaimed, trotting over for a quick kiss before carefully unwinding the sling he wore, to pass little Cortland to her.  “He’s been fussy all morning, and he won’t latch to Sarah for more than a few moments.” He gave her a smile. “He knows who his mamma is.”

      On cue, her boy squinched up his face and wailed his hunger. Hurriedly, she unbuttoned her work-shirt to offer him a milk-heavy breast, gasping as infant mouth attached with the strength of a woodland boar.

      “And here I thought breastfeeding would be peaceful and bonding,” she complained. “It’s more like a stagecoach robbery, being mugged for my milk.”

      Apple chuckled and sat to watch them, a smile on his face. “You’re responsible for what goes into the baby. I’m responsible for what comes out of the baby. But if it’s really all that bad, I keep telling you, there's a solution for that.”

      Eldest sat, still holding little Cortland to her breast. "We are *not* going to put our son in a badger hole."

      "But he has plainswoman blood! Badger milk is his birthright!" he teased.

      "Beloved. We are not going to stick our one and only son in a badger hole. Just take that absurd idea out of your adorable little head and toss it on the midden where it belongs!"

      "But my mother raised me on badger milk, and it was all for the best."

      "As far as I can tell your mother raised you on tall tales, love and an occasional apple, not badger milk."

      "Tch"," said Apple fondly. "That's the worst part of being a boy. You say 'yes' to a family of handsome women and all of a sudden they think they own you."

      "Well, we do."

      "No fair. You know I can’t resist you when you prove my points for me." He came over to kiss her. "Your night tonight, beloved,"

      "Mmm, looking forward to it. Just save the sauce for Whisper tomorrow. She wants one more before her Time and I'm not ready for another right now, even if I could."

      “Ah. You'll be wanting a cuddle-night, then?”

      “I didn’t say *that*", she smiled. “Just wear that white lacy thing you wore on our wedding-night, hmm?”

      “Ooo, as my Eldest-wife commands,” he promised fondly, then looked up to the hourglass, the sands running out. “That’s for my bread,” he said rising to attend to it. He glanced down at Cortland, then stooped low to whisper, “Take her for every drop you can, son; it’s the only way we menfolk get any of our own back.”

      “Oh, go on with your bad self!” she wished him with a laugh, watching him go, heart rising at the sight of him, their own.

      She relaxed, Cortland having settled to soft suckling that was… peaceful and bonding.  Enjoying the warm glow, she was startled when a small voice piped, “Reach for the sky, stranger!” Looking up, Little Eldie and her older sisters had crept close, surrounding her with their carved wooden six-shooters. “Oh no!” she exclaimed. “Spare me, kind ma’am, I have no coin!”

      Little Eldie, her face warpainted like a plainswoman with charcoal taken from the fire, crow feathers in her hair, straightened. “We want neither your coin nor your life, stranger!” she announced. “We’re husband-raiders, come to claim what’ll be ours! Hand over the boy and no one gets hurt!”

      “Not on your lives, you little savages!” she laughed. “Your brother is too young to play husband-raider. Let him grow up a little first!”

      “Awww, but you said that last week, Mother Elder!”

      “And I’ll say it next week, too. Go get one of his dolls to be the husband, instead.”

      “Awwww…” came the chorus, but Little Diana, second oldest, flounced off to see it done.

      While they waited Little Eldie came close, already long and rangy, like her birth mother. “Mama Bear, what is the fuss about boys anyway? He doesn’t look all that different from my littlest sisters.”

      Eldest glanced off to where Apple worked, and leaned close to her children. “Take a look at your Papa, darlings. What sort of a family would we have, without him?”

      “A hungry one,” offered little Emma, third eldest. “He does the cooking.”

      “The good cooking,” amended Bluebell. “Otherwise we’d have to eat Mama Hope’s broccoli soup every night, like when Papa was sick.”

      “Ewww,” came the chorus.

      “And since it takes a woman *and* a man to make a baby, how many of you would there be, without him?” she asked.

      Comprehension began to dawn on the older girl’s faces, and Eldest nodded somberly. “Men mean family, girls. They always have, they always will. Which is why women will fight to have them and keep them. You girls are lucky, though. You have a brother. One day, if you can keep him safe, you'll be able to trade brothers with another family, and go on to have a family of your own.”

      "Mama Bear?" asked Joy, a concerned expression on her face. "Real husband raiders. They wouldn't try to steal *Papa* would they? I mean, he's *our* Papa, not anyone else's."

      Eldest considered. Were they too young? But no, it was mostly the older girls, and the youngest weren't really paying attention. Not too early for them to know the facts of life. She leaned close to them all. "Oh my darlings... with twelve beautiful, healthy children, one of them a boy? There are women who would cheerfully commit murder to steal your Papa away from us. That's why it's so important that we keep him safe."

      It hit them hard, she could see. Some of the younger ones were near tears. “Now, now,” she reproached them. “Girls don’t cry. Girls have to be tough and strong so they can defend their families and menfolk.”

      It took a few tries but the girls dried their tears and did their best to look fierce. Just in time Diana flounced back with the rag doll a well-wisher had made for Cortland. “One husband on the hoof,” she announced cheerfully.

      Eldie looked at her sister and the offered doll but hesitated, looking at her father where he worked, snatching loaves out of the oven. “We don’t need to steal a boy from another family,” she told them thoughtfully. “We have a brother, so we can trade him for a husband instead.” She took the doll from her sister and held it up for all to see. “Now that we have a husband, we have to keep him safe.”

      “We could build a fort in the apple orchard,” offered Joy.

      “We’ll need our slingshots, in case raiders show up,” agreed April.

      “And provisions!” insisted Cassie. “We don’t know how long we’ll be in the field.”

      Hearing that, little Hestia trooped over to her father, tugging on his kilt to get his attention. “Papa, Papa, we need provisions,” she piped. “Hardtack, bully beef and tucker, just like mammas used to eat in the Army.”

      Apple scooped her up for a quick hug and a diaper check before setting her down once more. “Hard tack, bully beef?” he mused mournfully. “I don’t have any of those. Just cookies.”

      “Cookies!” Came the chorus and a thundering roll of feet as the pack surrounded him like a herd of puppies. Taking down a sack, he filled it with treats and scooted them all outside with their treasure. With a sigh of relief he sat with her once more, setting aside a two-week-old copy of the Clarion, its headline proudly announcing the first anniversary of the Queen’s wedding and the birth of a new princess.

      “You spoil them rotten,” she told him with a smile.

      “My mamma always said you can’t spoil a child with love, and I reckon a few cookies won’t ruin them either.”

      Cortland sleepily finished, losing interest in suckling and opening his mouth in a big yawn.

      “Typical,” she sighed. “A boob and a half and his lights go out. He’s done, but I’m not.”

      “I’m sure Sarah would appreciate the extra for little Becky.”

      “I’m sure she would, that little savage is cutting teeth!”

      “Mamma-badgers. I keep telling them, mamma-badgers, but do they listen? Noooo…” He gently took Cortland and expertly rubbed a burp out of him before wrapping him in the sling once more. Relaxing, he looked out the window to where the girls played in the orchard, building their fort, a faraway look in his eyes.

      “Are you happy, beloved?”

      He gave her an adorable shy smile, reaching for the basket on the table and taking an apple, which he divided in two for her to share. “Of course. Heaven is where you get to eat apples every day. Hell is when someone steals your apple and eats it in front of you.”

Chapter Text

~ Epilogue ~

~ First Nights, The Morning After, Eldest ~

      The morning after the wedding Eldest awoke to the scent of cinnamon, warm and oddly at peace with herself and the world. Sleepily she wondered at the scent and realized it was from the soap Apple had used on his hair, his darkening mane of reddish-cedar-gold nestled before her as she spooned him from behind. Memories rushed to fill the morning void. Their wedding, their shared night of passion, her body that ached in all the right places. Involuntarily her arms tightened around him and he stirred, yawning. Murmuring sweet noises of contentment as he snuggled back into her lap. Awakened, her body pulsed with need to be with him again. Her hand sought him, unready but hardening wantonly at her touch.

      “Na-na,” he scolded sleepily. “Yesterday’s sauce was yours. Today’s belongs to Whisper.”

      “She’ll never know,” she murmured slyly, stroking him even firmer, making him ready for her.

      “Oh, no you don’t,” he insisted, coming fully awake. “A husband can’t play favorites. Papa Bear was real specific about that, and he ought to know. He had thirty wives, each one had to wait a month before her turn, but he managed to keep them all content. I’m lucky to have so few.”

      “It’s not fair,” she sulked. “Every other species has males and females in equal measure, why not womankind?”

      “The other beasts didn’t sin against the gods and meddle with the tree of life, like Men did.”

      “Ah yes. It’s all men’s fault.”

      “I wouldn’t be so cavalier,” he warned. “You women meddled with the tree of Good and Evil long before we ever tampered with the Tree of Life. Without the temptation to evil, I’m sure we men would have left the other tree fair enough alone.”

      She chuckled. “No one forced you to eat that fruit.”

      “It was an apple!” he protested. “What man’s going to say no when his wife brings him an apple?”

      “Not you, that’s for sure,” she scolded, drawing him down to kiss him. Delightfully, he didn’t stop there, kissing his way down her body, clearly bent on teasing ecstasies from her again. Of their own accord her hands caressed his muscular back and the glory of his mane, but she suddenly stilled them. There was something there that had eluded her last night, in the dim candle light.

      “Hold still, I want to see this.” She shifted from beneath him, her fingers trailing down his flank to his hip and an oddly circular blemish there, a little larger than a silver gil.

      “It’s… a tattoo?” she asked angrily. “Those Boze bitches weren’t content with just branding you, they had to tattoo you as well?”

      “Oh, the Bozes didn’t do that,” he told her lightly. “My mamma gave me that, when I was eleven.”

      “Your mother gave you this?” She peered closer, grateful for the morning light from the narrow windows.

      “She did. I think it’s a protective spell. Plains magic. She gave it to me when we were still riding with the Sibleys. She’d taken a nasty tumble while roping a steer that didn’t take kindly to being roped. That rattled her noggin pretty good. I was ever so worried about her. Papa Bear himself tended her, but it was two days before she came to her senses again. I guess that got her thinking about dying and what might happen to me if she did, seeing as how she was all I had in the world. So she gave that to me as a protection.”

      “It’s… Feathers?” Eldest peered closer; there were three feathers, two crossed larger ones, one red, one more of an outline of a feather, against Apple’s creamy pale skin. A third smaller black feather lay beneath the other two, surrounded by odd glyph-like symbols in a circle about them.

      “What do the glyphs mean?” she asked, fascinated.

      Apple peered over his shoulder, trying for a better look. “I don’t know. She told me that was a woman-thing, so she couldn’t teach me.”

      Eldest sighed and lay by him in the bed again. “Your mother was very secretive. I suppose it only makes sense, trying to protect a boy all by herself, but I wonder sometimes if she didn’t do her job a little too well.”

      Apple nodded. “As I got older I thought so myself. There was something she was cautious of, something out west. So we’d never go to the Great Rendezvous with the tribes, we’d take other work while the Sibleys went west to visit their kin. That was how we first started working for the Bozes, in fact,” he told her bitterly.

      He looked over to her. “I think she had a quarrel out west, maybe even an old-fashioned blood feud. All she would tell me was that my family had powerful enemies that would kill us both if they ever got wind of us, and that she’d tell me more when I was older.” He sighed, looking up at the ceiling. “She never got the chance.”

Chapter Text

Author’s note

This story is intended to be a sort of pre-sequel to A Brother’s Price, in that it begins about five years before the events in ABP, and ends one year after the princess’s marriage in ABP. It could probably be tightened up a bit, but I couldn’t resist trying to fill in some of the missing pieces of the world of ABP, or at least the missing pieces as I imagine them to be. Comments and non-flame-y criticism are appreciated.

For those interested: The character of Apple is heavily based on the life of the real-world Civil War drummer boy Johnny Clem (or Klem). Readers familiar with the period will notice the many parallels (and sometimes, outright quotes) between the two, and many of the events in this story are based on actual events in Johnny Clem’s life. Like Apple, Johnny Clem ran away from home after his mother died and tried to enlist in the Union Army. Rejected at first because of his size and age, Johnny eventually informally joined the 22nd Michigan volunteer infantry, becoming a drummer boy and later a line soldier. He may or may not have fought at Shiloh before joining the 22nd; there is no question he fought at Chickamauga, a little more than a year later, shooting a Confederate Colonel and eventually being promoted to sergeant. He is still the youngest noncommissioned officer ever to serve with the American Army and when he retired (as a major general) he was the last Civil War veteran still on the active duty roles. He was well-known at the time of the Civil War and a number of photographs of him still exist, available by simply Googling his name. In true ABP fashion, Apple is the reverse of the many women, such as Frances Clayton, who disguised themselves as men in order to be able to serve in the United States Civil War. Those wanting to know more about his life might want to read his own (relatively brief) account of his career. While some of his account may sound strange to modern readers, like anyone else Johnny Clem was a person of his time, and that time was a good deal less gentle than the one we enjoy now.

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