Author’s Note:
I’ve had the idea of writing an all-female society for years, but not in the sense that there aren’t any men, or that men don’t exist—but they live separately. At one point, the genders did live together just as we do now, but slowly over time, as women became educated and influential figures, marriage and birth rates plummeted. They began to lose their rights to govern their own bodies, make decisions about reproduction, what they should wear, who they worship, and who they were allowed to love. Sound familiar?
The final straw that breaks the women’s backs is the destruction of all temples worshiping female deities, along with murders and rapes that go without repercussion. I’m inspired by the various women’s movements that exist all around the world, such as the 4B Movement in South Korea, voluntary celibacy, and “Boy Sober,” started by Gen Zers, to name a few. Margaret Atwood said of The Handmaid Tale, “I would not put anything into the book that human beings had not already done in some other place or time.”
Moving on …
A war happens, uniting the women together, “The Great Divide,” and only the main character, Neva, and the elders remember this time. Hundreds of years have passed, and this is where the story kicks off. Evangeline is an established city of women who have mostly never resided alongside men.
When I began to write, my heart ached at the overall disrespect and unfair treatment of women, in general, and with that feeling, I started thinking of what the world would be like if the genders were separate.
I became fascinated by a lecture at the Penn Museum, “Amazons: Warrior Women in Myth, Art, and History” by Adrienne Mayor, while simultaneously binge-watching Dr. Amanda Foreman’s “The Ascent of Woman.” The lecture goes over how archaeologists discovered that the bones of what they thought were male soldiers who died in battle were female skeletons with proof down to their bones that they had been in battles.
They even discovered adolescent female skeletons buried with ancient “warrior dolls,” as if these women were idols they looked up to. Although the book is feminist fantasy fiction, it incorporates a significant amount of historical accuracy, which creates a sense of realism in the storyline. My hope for the book is to demonstrate the profound impact of love, its profound effect on us when we are faced with betrayal, and how quickly we can transition from a loving embrace to violence and destruction. Is it better for us to stay apart? How can we coexist in peace while respecting one another? And what is that one thing that can bring the genders back together as one?
P.S. Some things only make sense in my head; let me know if they don’t make sense in yours. These first few pages have been rewritten, revised, and rearranged several times already. I’m eager to see how they compare them to previous workshops, as this revision has never been presented before. Still needs a ton of work!
Thank you,
Kimberly Jackson
Evangeline
By:
Kimberly M. Jackson
Neva had lived so long that she had stopped counting her age at about 329 years. She kept a tally of her years in the ledger of the Quick and the Dead, placed on her favorite bookshelf—one of hundreds. She made her mark every new spring but had not counted since her 329th year on the 29th day of Spring. The tally marking each year done without thought, a ritual of the last vestiges of a mortal life. Neva was quite sure that her actual age was nearing one thousand years, the ledger pages crumbling in bits at the slightest touch. Then on an ordinary day, she stopped making her mark, closed the ledger, and placed it back on the shelf. She didn’t quite know why she had chosen to stop, or maybe she had grown tired of the constant reminder that she would never die.
Neva was the regent ruler of a nation of women, Evangeline, who had never known any other ruler except Neva. They only knew that she filled in a spot for the absent or too-busy queen Dido, whom only the Old Ones had ever seen; these wise and immortal mothers of Evangeline, who had been there from the beginning. Neva speculated as to where Dido could be, but even she didn’t know the whereabouts of their lost queen. What she knew for sure, the one certain thing, was that she had spent more than three hundred years waiting for the return of Dido. Neva, most believed, was as old as the Earth itself. Only her white waist-length braids told the story of her age. Her face never revealed the secret of her true antiquity, and with each passing year, her deep brown skin became tighter and more luminous than the other women of the city. What Neva was and had always been was an enigma.
Neva was Evangeline’s living goddess, older than the Old Ones, and crowned by Dido, the first of us, to rule over the land of women, the City of Evangeline. Dido, heartbroken and deserted by her lover, had begun to slip into the dark pit of madness. She could no longer keep her focus on the territories and provinces in Evangeline, and slowly she pushed more responsibility to Neva, who already ruled her own territory in the North of Evangeline.
Distraught, Dido disappeared, leaving word with the council that Neva was to take over as regent. It had been more than three hundred years, and now Dido was a rumor to the young women of Evangeline, an ancient deity that never really existed. Evangeline was a high-walled, wooded fortress. Neva’s home, located in the North of Evangeline, was a magnificent showpiece of white marble inlaid with gold and walls of astonishing alabaster, 70-foot marble pillars with ornately carved capitals, waving flags of silks in lilac, rose, ivory, and blue, representing the four provinces within Evangeline.
In the North, the women fished, hunted, and had enormous icehouses to store and dry fish and meat. In their leisure time, the women skated on large ice rinks and competed in games and races on the ice. The women skied, and the children rolled themselves down snow hills like fluffy white barrels, making snow people of the elders they disliked by placing bent branches as disfigured noses on the snow peoples faces before they were caught and forced to kick it down. The white snow covered the mountains in the distance, providing a sense of ease to Neva’s spirit, and she let out a deep sigh of relief.
“Home.”
The Northland of snow and ice had always been Neva’s home, her Queendom. Even before the Great Divide separated the men, and the land of women did not exist. A time before time when her heart still beat, and she was a beloved Queen with a King. But she kept these matters to herself, as there was no one now who lived that could remember her as she was. There was one other who still breathed like her but whose heart no longer beat, who knew of Neva, the Queen of the North. With Dido’s absence, Neva became ruler of both upper and lower Evangeline. And then there were the great white trees of the northern forest that encapsulated her palace; they remembered it all, but the trees would never tell – unless asked.
#
For what seemed like short years to the women, centuries had passed in the land of Evangeline, a lush, green land of beauty and serenity. The women had lived in a world of peace and love, running through the heavily wooded forests barefoot and bare-chested, hair blown in the wind, highlighted by the sun. The little ones swung from branches with juicy, dripping fruits hanging from their mouths. The women laughed, sang songs to the goddesses, offered lambs, and performed the sacred ceremony of Virenna, marking the girls’ first menstruation and the beginning of all things.
Virenna was celebrated every full moon. The bonfire fete was arranged to be a great spectacle of decoration with ribbons of all colors hanging from the trees that surrounded it. Every instrument known was played in merriment, the songs of the Old Ones. The women chanted songs that might invoke the goddess to make an appearance on this special occasion. Queen Dido, the first of them, had a statue at every cathedral where offerings and prayers were left. The decay of old flowers and sentiment was swept away weekly.
The children would say that the smell of ash and smoke followed Dido everywhere she went, ashes and cinders of her burnt flesh falling to the ground. Often, a child would report that she had seen Dido weeping in the forest. But children usually see and hear things that are not always there. And there was always a tale of someone seeing Dido and speaking with her—mostly idle talk for when the women had begun to drink and to drink too much. Neva marveled at the women’s devotion, as they had never seen Dido, but their faith in her remained unwavering. It was this type of blind devotion that made Neva nervous and fearful of what was inevitably fated to come.
#
“We are riders. Our business is with bow and spear. We know nothing of women’s work.”
The women trained themselves in warfare. From the time they can walk, the girls learn how to ride horses, archery, falconry, use spears, sling stones, and handle the lariat. The girls know how to hunt and the ways to survive outside the world of women, taught to respect nature while honoring the kill of the hunt. There were blacksmiths to make weapons and cooks to bring in daily meals; usually, the older women who had spent their youth fighting in past battles. Most had retired to care for Evangeline’s children, but in the event of an emergency, all women, young and old, must fight. The elders’ skin bore the scars of hundreds of summers spent fighting in the brutal sun, and the ink from their tattoos bled into the wrinkled creases of their skin.
In the southern region of Evangeline, there was a training division where girls as young as ten years old trained. Upon first leaving their mothers, the girls cry and beg to stay home. The girls who wanted to remain on became warriors, mercenaries, and highly skilled assassins. The girls who stayed slowly transitioned from girl to warrior. The girls had been taught since birth that men and boys were dangerous, if not outright enemies, using their beloved goddesses’ tragic love stories as an example of men’s betrayal and deception, and that there was no such thing as love between men and women, only manipulation. They had been taught the old stories of when men and women lived together, but never in equality or harmony, and they had been taught about the wars that initiated the Great Divide, how poorly and unfairly women had been treated by men.
A woman who lets her guard down around a man is a dead woman. Evangeline was not a prison, and if the women wanted to mate with men, they would have to leave Evangeline to do so, sending any male-born children back to Sunderhelm, the land of men, and back to the father who had sired them. Forbidden to enter the gates of Evangeline, the men who expected sons waited for the babies to be brought out. If no baby was given, the man could assume the infant had died or had been born a girl. Marriage, usually an afterthought, was allowed under the stipulation that the woman had killed a man of the enemy first; this requirement often went unfulfilled, leaving some women never to marry and never to leave Evangeline.
Although the girls were young, they were faster than all the others. The girls caught on quicker and were able to infiltrate places where a grown woman could not go unnoticed. The Little Ones could go undetected, ignored, and overlooked in a world that treated children with cruel indifference, never suspecting it was a child who could slit throats quietly in the night.
The Little Ones had no fear, believing themselves invincible and even more skilled than the very ones who had taught them. The arrogance of the little warriors worried their elders, who made no mention of their concerns to Neva. There were the Old Ones, who had been alive as long as Neva and whose arthritic hands were so painful and curled that they could sometimes only grasp their walking sticks. The repeated use and the millions of pullbacks on the bow in battles left their hands almost useless and bowed legs from spending their lives atop horses.
If one did not possess such ailments, she could not call herself a woman. She was still a girl, and girls are under the tutelage of women in all things. Within all pubescent children lies the need to be free from the constant watch of the Old Ones. The girls’ need for space and freedom grew stronger with every new skill they learned and every obstacle they overcame. The girls would challenge their instructors, who fiercely and swiftly reminded them of their inferiority. The little ones, angered by the humiliation of it all, sheathed their swords and sat back down. They had long left the warm bosoms of their mother’s protective breast. When she turned 12 years old, the child stayed away from those sweet motherly kisses and lullabies until she could fully manage her emotions, until she was a fully skilled assassin.
#
Amisi was in between times because she was neither old nor as young as the little ones who adored her. The teachers had long given up their hopes that Amisi would become an instructor or a leader. On the day of her graduation, Amisi was not found in the circle with the other students awaiting their awards and feasting on the sumptuous banquet made especially for them. Passing the banquet tables, accounting for proper seat placements and that there were enough bottles of wine, Kadijah, one of the girls’ instructors, had noticed that there were bottles of wine missing from the table. Khadijah was a large woman, standing over 6ft tall. Found abandoned and left to die right outside the gates of Evangeline. She did not say it aloud, but the looks on the girls’ faces gave away the secret of the missing bottles and the one bold enough to take them.
Gathering up her skirts and underskirts, Khadija left the celebration, marching into the woods as if going into battle. She followed the sounds of laughter, play, and the clinking of glass, the lute strumming a low, familiar tune. She thought her heavy marching steps would alert them to her presence, but they did not, and the laughter grew louder, becoming recognizable. Coming upon a creek, with two Willow trees bent down together in the shape of a heart. Strewn on the tree’s branches were silks of blush, teal, and lilac blowing in the wind like a whimsical surrender by an army of fairies. Amisi, deep in the embrace of an unknown male from the land of men, did not even notice Khadija standing right behind her.
“Amisi!’ She exclaimed. “And how dare you break through our borders, boy?!”
“I let him in!” Amisi shouted.
Khadija slapped Amisi across her face, and the wind stopped; the flowers shrunk back in their buds, and the Willows swayed and cracked even though no wind moved them. Amisi ran deep into the forest until Khadija could no longer make her out, leaving her to deal with the young man, who quickly dressed and gathered his things. To report him would surely be his death. Khadija decided to let this go, forgiving his foolish act in her mind. Young dumb love. Who would not fall in love and follow Amisi to the ends of the Earth? Even if it meant death, to the enchanted, she was worth it.
Unlike the women and girls, Amisi’s mother was a mystery, a phantom that no one was sure ever even existed, found in the forest during the springtime in a patch of flowers, a baby all alone, not crying but laughing and giggling the beautiful way babies do. The flowers drooped down around her like playmates tickling her soft, round belly, while the rose buds kissed her cherub cheeks. The baby was commanding the flowers, much like a conductor leading an orchestra.
This tiny baby, who could not speak, controlled the flowers and the trees around her. Neva named the baby, Amisi, for she was young and beautiful, just like the always-in-bloom flowers she commanded. As the child grew, so did her talents. When she threw tantrums or was angry, the flowering wild around them would rot and turn to ash. Just as quickly as she could lose her temper, she could be instantly happy again. And from the ashes, new trees, greener and more vibrant than before, would burst forth from the ground, along with fresh flora of every kind and color, scenting the air.
It was often said that the child Amisi was spoiled and treated far better than she deserved out of fear that her anger would kill crops and decimate the forests. Her young, undeveloped mind could not control her powers. On occasion, Amisi would be kidnapped by captors in the night to be killed or left far away to be abandoned or to die from exposure. Her captors never could seem to make it out of Evangeline’s city gates alive.
Each time, she would be brought back to Khadija smiling and unscathed. She reached her sixteenth year, and the elders became even more worried about her powers and how she might choose to use them. The elders petitioned Neva to have Amisi killed or sent away. Neva refused as she sought to discipline the child in her way. Neva sat in the second great chair on the throne, the first being Dido’s chair, which was never to be sat in, listening to the complaints of the Old Ones and even her daughter, Neema.
“She must be sent away, Mother!” Neema screamed.
“Her powers will only grow the older she gets, Neva. If we do not act now…” said an elder.
“She will what? Take over? Ruin us?” Neva smirked.
Neva sprang up from the throne seat, approaching the elders with a slow but steady gait, regal in her movements. The closer she came to her daughter and the elders, the palace room began to frost over, and the windows cracked from ice. The fountains froze, and frigid air blew from their mouths and nostrils. The women held their arms tightly together, shivering, watching their fingers turn blue. Passing the freezing women, Neva’s long white braids swinging down her back, she stopped at the door and turned around, facing them, watching their bodies become weak from the cold.
“Let us not forget that the child isn’t the only one who has power.”
Neva left the throne room, the large doors opening without her guards touching them. The fireplaces instantly were ablaze, and the frost and ice of the room were gone as if they had never happened.
#
Amisi’s lover ran as if the devil was chasing him back to his horse that was left tied to a tree outside the gates of Evangeline. He jumped into his saddle without even untying the poor horse and as he galloped away , strips of bark ripped off the tree, like a banana peeling taking a few branches with him down the road. Evageline was surrounded by high walls and gates , there was only one way in and one way out; but not for him. He had been sneaking in since childhood, dressed as a girl, to see his mother. But this time was different- the women were distracted and he was able to catch the ferry that carried him to the entrance of Sunderhelm.
#
It was cold and confining inside the basket Neva had placed her in. A basket made of reeds and branches from the southern banks. And now Seraphine missed the heat of the river and the smell of frogs and the other amphibious life that lived there. She was cramped and cold inside the basket and only saw bits of light here and there, that poked through the basket eyelets and chilly water dripped in during the day, when the sun had melted the snow that had fallen on the basket at night.
But this was the way of travel for Seraphine these days and it was also the safest mode possible. Seraphine’s fiery red and serpent like appearance scared humans and most wanted to kill her on first sight. If only they knew that she was once human too. What she was now was a cursed thing. A hybrid reptile with the body of a snake and the head of a dragon. She breathed fire and could stand in the way only a snake could; an armless balance of confidence steadying herself on her belly fifty feet in the air if provoked. Her scales were bright orange and red and she hissed while she slept coiled up in the basket like a long piece of rope.
She was always grateful to her sister Neva who carried her to the North for a cure for her horrid state. So long had she been this beast that she could no longer remember her human life and in her secret space she admitted that she enjoyed taking revenge and found pleasure in watching her victims burned to a cinder. A snake Seraphine was with encrusted rubies and gold embedded in her scales so that when the sun hit her exactly right, she appeared as a glittering river that slithers and shines while bewitching and entrancing the onlooker with her beauty. One might almost forget that she was also a dragon.
During that night, when the sun had fallen and hid itself behind the snowy mountains, was Seraphine allowed to be in her human form again. In the beginning, she had the entire night from sunset to sunrise. Now as the years have passed, her nighttime of womanly leisure was getting shorter every year. She was down to only 4 hours a night. It would not be long before she was permanently in reptilian form, cursed forever. Vulnerable during the night, Neva kept the secret of her most beloved sister in her palace, safe from those who sought to murder her, rip her apart for her golden seals and rubies. Unlike Amisi, who just received threats from the elders, Seraphine had been forced out of Evangeline on the basis that no one could ever really trust a snake.
For over two hundred years had Neva waited on her sister preparing rooms with large fireplaces and built in ponds to make her feel wanted and welcomed. Tended monthly, the unoccupied rooms sat with roaring fires forever blazing in hopes that Seraphine would come to her. Neva only ever received letters of her travels, one of a Queen in a distant land.
Dearest Sister,
I have made my way to a new land unlike the lush and greenery of Evangeline, this place is mostly sand, the heat is very much to my liking. I am accompanied by Kalida, your servant girl, who is not pleased with this weather and frankly is having a tough time of it. It will take her months if not years to adjust her body to this land. If she can stay alive that long. I appreciate the help sister but send a southern girl next time. The Queen of Egypt, Cleopatra, the seventh of her namesake, has honored me in her court. Everyone is anxious to see the women from Evangeline, the land of women. So many questions sister. She has arranged for us comfortable rooms and protection. Thanks to your letter she knows what I am and is fascinated by me. This is my vanity speaking when I know it is only that I am the sister of the great Queen Neva of the North.
With gratitude,
Seraphine
#
“But I will not go!! You cannot make me! I do not care how big you are, Khadija! You cannot make me!” Amisi pouted and crossed her arms, she was a small thing and to Khadija, no more than a spoiled little girl. Khadija took Amisi’s clothes off the racks, out of the drawers and into leather trunks as she tuned out Amisi’s whining.
“It is Neva’s wish that you live at the palace now so that you can hone your skills.” Khadija said.
“You mean so she can watch me. Make sure I do not run off with any of the King’s men, eh? “Amisi scoffed.
“It is a blessing to even be near Neva child. Like you, she saved me, a little premature baby left to die. She saw something in me, believed in me. Just like she sees something special in you. Now I hear that I am the biggest woman in Evangeline!”
Khadija and Amisi both laughed and embraced one another. Amisi’s small head resting on the soft full bosom of Khadija. She was the only mother she had ever known. When everyone else feared her and children did not want to play with her, there was always Khadija wiping her tears, giving her kisses, soup, and warm hugs. It is this very reason that the outside of Khadija’s house stayed covered in red and pink roses.
“Khadija, I’m afraid.”
“There’s nothing to be afraid of my love.” Kissing her softly on her forehead.
l
Amisi looked up from her embrace to see Khadijah’s eye’s bulging, a line of blood pouring out of her mouth and her large body slumped to the ground with an arrow in her back. Confused and panicked, she shook the body of Khadija, but life had left her. Amisi could hear the screams of the other girls coming out of their homes with blood on their hands shouting out of each house that their mothers, aunts and grandmothers
The elders of every household were being killed, shot down with a distinct arrowhead! A shape that Amisi recognized. From the sky Amisi summoned her falcon Pere to her mouth and began to whisper into its beak. Pere flew off towards the North of Evangeline, its pointy wings flapping rapidly in the distance.
#
Pere reached the northern palace, delivering its message to the back windows of the falconry, hitting its beak against the glass cracking it. The window opens to let Pere fly in; his wings covered in snow. Pere knew where to go and to whom to deliver the message. Whispering his message in the ear of the sleeping falconer, his eyes open, rising quickly almost falling to the ground, taking Pere with him on his shoulder to the Princess.
“Come along boy, no time to waste!” said the falconer to Pere with a quick kiss on the head. Pere flew ahead of the falconer in their race to the Princesses chamber. Arriving to the Princesses rooms they found her not there and headed straight to Neva’s chambers.
#
Neema’s heart pounded fiercely against her sternum, rattling her ribcage and its intercostal spaces. The sealed letter she clutched to her chest, steaming hot from Hela’s domain, but the thought of whom she must deliver it to filled her body with something colder, something older. A dread that had a name– Isis, Lilith, Queen of the North, Neva the Undying–– to Neema her name was Mother, and although they resided in the same castle, she had not laid eyes upon Neva in six moons.
Clutching the steaming correspondence from Hela, between her swollen fingers, Neema staggered to Neva’s chamber with reluctance, a fear—she should turn around – the separation of her pelvic bones slowly making themselves apparent with sporadic stabbing hip pains. The envoy advised that, per Hela’s instructions, only she was to deliver the message to Neva and that in the hands of another, the letter would be destroyed.
Neema’s heart raced faster than her feet could, and she found it difficult to sprint while holding the weighty layers of her dress and the letter, all while bearing the ever-growing pain in her body. Down the white marble corridor, she hobbled with a determined yet jolting shuffle, grabbing vainly at the marble walls for rest and finally to the massive doors of her mother’s heavily guarded chamber. Even as a daughter of Neva, the guards were reluctant to let Neema through; the familiar seal on the correspondence and Neema’s panicking and shocking appearance were her only ticket in.
Neema found her mother, as always, splendid and breathtaking on the balcony overlooking the city of perpetual snow. Forgetting the pain in her spine, the feet that were rushing stopped to stare, gawk even at her mother, who was always so far away, even while in her presence, Neema could never get close enough to touch. Neva’s thick silvery gown was trimmed in white fur, accentuating a slender waist and wide hips. Her deep brown skin and green eyes glowed as emerald stones against the moonlight of the frosted-over city.
“Mother! A messenger has come from the Black Sea with a letter!
Neva’s back remains turned away from Neema; her daughter’s presence has no effect on her body, causing it to remain in its perched position. She had lived centuries, gaining powers, and now her eyes were only secondary entities to what gave her sight.
“Hela’s wax crest. I’ve always wondered what type of wax could withstand Hell.”
“Mother, you must listen, you must read the letter!” Neema screamed at Neva painfully, her body crushing sharply into her hips, warm blood and fluid running down her legs.
The chamber doors reopen to show the falconer and Pere bowing before the Queen, and with terror in their eyes, the bow at the sight of the Princess Neema. Pere flew over to Neva, resting his claws into the white fur collar on her shoulder, and began to whisper Callish in her ear, the language of falcons.
“WHAAAT!? Neva shouts, turning her body to face Neema. Pere flies back to the falconer’s shoulder.
Neema’s body sways before Neva, as if a strong wind ordered her steps, her feet and toes now covered in blood and amniotic fluids, saturating the many hems of her dress and underskirts.
“You are with child? Now you make decisions without my approval?!
“How is it you see everyone and EVERYTHING but me?!” Neema collapses into what sounds like a shallow pool of water. The falconer ran to Neema, sliding his hands under her body to catch her fall. Neva stands over Neema, unimpressed, unfazed, unmoved.
“What is there to see!?” Neva scoffs.
“Your daughter.”
#
LETTERS FROM HELL #1
To Neva the Undying, Queen of Upper and Lower Evangeline,
I’ve received word that your queendom is regrettably under attack. What a shame! I hope that these usurpers are brought to Evangeline’s swift and good justice. Unfortunately, I must add salt to an already open wound. Our mutual friend has overstayed her welcome; one thousand years is long enough for any guest, don’t you think? I didn’t think anyone could make Hell more miserable than Dido.
Even the demons have tired of her whining- and they feed off the tears of the weary. Who could irritate a demon? If she’s not retrieved soon, I shall make her one of us; no longer a Queen, no longer a goddess, but one of the damned, the curse – but ask her and she is already this – and the very reason she refuses to leave. Maybe then I, and the demons of hell, will be able to stand her more. You have until the next moon to retrieve her, or maybe you have grown to love your dominance over both realms. I care not either way.
Forever your faithful enemy,
Hela
#
Amisi stood in the streets, shocked as the horror unfolded before her eyes. The screams of the daughters pierced her ears with a sharpness that ached her ears to bleeding. Her anger building and rising to each scream and the murderous sights of beloved elders with arrows in their bodies, their skirts drenched in blood. Amisi sat in the road of chaos, inhaling deep breaths of the dirt that surrounded her. The earth rocked and the women ran and clutched fearfully to whatever they could reach.
Amisi breathed in again a deep breath and the earth not only rocked a great motion but cracked opening the many layers and universes beneath them. In the smoke and sandstorm of dust, Amisi could see quick flashes of skin and legs that leaped on and off rooftops to escape. The murderers, leaping so fast from rooftops, appeared as black beams or rays too quickly to make out who or even what they were.
One single arrow scraped across her cheek cutting a deep gnash across her face. As the smoke cleared the women came out of their hiding, their hands covered in blood holding the black and gold arrows they had pulled from the dead bodies of the elders and Old Ones. The spear heads of the arrows were golden, glinting against the light of the street torches that were lit at night lining the roads. These arrows were not from Evangeline.
Amisi thought back to the colors of her lover by the river, his golden vest underneath a silken black overcoat accentuated with gold buttons. The arrows of Sunderhelm, land of men. Amisi kept this information to herself and went back to her home, the home she had once shared with Khadija. She didn’t bring Khadija’s body out to the streets like the others. She wanted her to herself before her body was destroyed. Amisi laid down next to Khadijah’s large body, placing one had on Khadijah’s chest crying herself to sleep.
#
Not many slept that night in southern Evangeline. The woman pulled out of all the arrows from their loved ones, throwing them all of them in one pile in the center of town, at the base of one of Dido’s many statues. The bodies of the elders and Old Ones laid out in rows around the courtyard. The elders and Old Ones left spoke loudly approaching the large pile that had now reached Dido’s waist. They shouted and blamed the younger women for not having faith in Dido’s return, for sneaking off to sleep with men and even some who dared to fall in love and leave Evangeline. All the sins committed, and the death of the elders were punishment for their disobedience.
The girls and the little ones sat at the feet of the women crying out for their grandmothers, their sisters, and aunts. No arms could console them, no hugs or kisses could calm them, the women let them cry, allowing pain to envelope them, most for the first time. To know that pain and grief was a solitary act, to know that you were and are alone in it, your own universe of tears.
The older women watched them making sure not to touch them during the process. To know pain, is to know what being a woman is. The world is alive because of the pain that women bear to bring life into it. The women watched knowing that this pain was only a small thing and that the girls had so much more pain to look forward to.
Pere flew back from the North to find Amisi still in the home she shared with Khadijha lying in a corner of a room, asleep on the stony floor. The rooms had never been so cold and drafty. There was a wind that swayed the house like a Willow tree in a thunderstorm.
Pere flapped his wings, spilling bits of cold droplets onto Amisi’s skin alerting her of the falcon’s presence. Pere placed his small head under Amisi’s chin, nudging it upwards. One nudge, two nudge, three…
“Yes, I know, Pere.” She said lifting her head frustratingly, “I’m trying to leave, I am.”
But that wasn’t the truth and even a bird could gather that she hadn’t moved much in days, weeks. The once tidy and cozy home where laughter and warmth lived was like a grave and only the memories of happier times remained. Amisi felt naked, unarmed, alone. When did she last eat? How many days had gone by?
Pere flew out of an open window, snapping off a dried dead rose by its stem, and placing the rose at Amisi’s feet. The roses were dead. The roses that Amisi created for Kadijah that once blanketed the house with their vibrant crimsons and corals had shriveled up when Kadijah passed.
“No, Pere. Let the dead stay dead.”
Taking the falcon in her arms she wiped off his wet feathers with a cloth, cleaning his wings and talons. Time passed as Amisi replayed her last moments with Khadijah, the moments in her childhood when the other children dared not to play with her and Khadijah was the only mother she’d ever known.
Amisi couldn’t stay in the home she and Khadijha had once lived in. Even if she weren’t due to see Neva, she knew it would be painful to stay. The rainy season had begun, bringing heavy waters and flooding in some parts, in addition to the chaos that had ensued, Amisi was still due in the North. She feared seeing Neva without the wise counsel and reassurance of Khadija. She couldn’t leave now. Now without finding out who did this and why.
Chapter 2
Sorrowbend Woods
Before she could open her eyes, she felt the pain in her body, smelled the rot of open wounds, and old blood wafting in the air. She lay on what might have been a bed —a slab of rock covered in animal fur, dried herbs, and skinned rabbits —hung from the stone ceiling. This wasn’t her first time on the slab rock bed, but it was the first time she was too large for it to accommodate her long limbs and wide torso. Yes, she had indeed been here inside this cave before.
The wound where the arrow had penetrated her flesh was now stuffed with an earthy green poultice. The herbs sizzled and fried within the gaping wound, releasing small, fleshy-smelling vapors of smoke. Her eyes were fully open now , the hearth carefully carved out in the center of the rock cave exposing the inner beauty of aged stones and slanted rock. Flanking each side of the hearth were carved effigys of Neva and Dido, both with unknown men on their arms. A woman drapped in tattered clothes and long greasy brown hair stands in the distance of the cave, grinding a substance into a powder.
Who are the men carved with our Queens? Where am I?
“You’ve always asked too many questions Khadija. When you were a girl, I thought it was cute, now its just an annoyance.” The woman turned now with a small laugh, her arms pushing Khadijah’s large body back onto the rock bed.
“ And I hated when you listened to my thoughts!” Khadijah groaned, remembering small pieces of a life before Evangeline. She pushed her body back on the animal fur mattress, her blood sticky and adhering to its thick hairs.
“I still have some powers left. Sleeping with men doesn’t take them all away. But indeed, it does take most of it…” The woman began to ramble on, forgetting Khadijah’s presence in the cave, speaking to and answering herself as if no one was there except her and her conscience.
“Nabiyre — I thought I was dead.”
“ You were dead, for a little while at least. I told you, I still have some of the old ways about me.”
“How’d you know ____”
“ I found you in this very forest, a premature babe, left to exposure. I bound you to me then. I’ll always know where you are.”
Small rodents, a fox, a cat, a mouse, scurry about the dirt floor running over Nabirye’s bare feet as she speaks, unbothered, unmoved by the race that is taking place over her feet. The fox chases the cat, the cat chases the mouse. A strong wind blows through the cavity of the cave lifting up the makeshift door of animal hyde skin.
“ What happened to me? Where’s Amisi? I have to get back!”
“ Drink this, child”, pushing a cup forcefully against Khadija’s lips. “ You’re not ready to leave just yet.”
Gulping down the bitter substance, Khadija remembers the arrow piercing her flesh, the room spins, her eyes fixed on the carving of Neva in the arms of a man, a King…Dido in flames… Amisi calling out to her in the darkness.
Sleep.
#
Sorrowbend Woods 50 years prior…
Nabiyre could always rely on the woods to provide, give her what she needed allowing her to be independent. Unlike others, she knew where to look for plants that remedied ailments, sour stomachs, wounds, powerful plants that eased the the pain of childbearing and even the necromantic roots that could bring the dead back to life.
It was these very herbs that made her famous in Sorrowbend, her knowledge of their properties that had been passed down from her mother, grandmother and her grandmother’s mother and so on longer down the line than she could account for. All of them witches. Forest witches to be exact. Not to be confused with the Winter Witches of Northern Evangeline where the Great Neva the Undying rules, no there is a major difference.
In Sorrowbend woods it was always autumn and the crush of dead leaves crunched underfoot with everystep Nabirye made. A basket hung from the crook of her arm filled with plants, berries, toads and salamanders, most of it not even what she needed but it made for a good cover for the ever watchful eyes of the trees who relayed messages between the each other throughout the forest in a language no one alive could understand anymore. She would take most of what she scavenged home and the other to leave as an offering at Thaleth’s temple, the mother goddess of Sorrowbend forest witches.
“ I can feel you woody eyes upon me you sap suckin’ root snitch! ‘aint yourn business what I does and where I does it and who I does it to!”
Nabiyre forces her head back as far as she can to eye in vain the massive and impossible heights of these great ancient trees. The trees make no movements, the constant rain of leaves have stopped and the wind ceases to blow.
“You don’t scare me sap sucker.”
Nabirye gathers her basket and begins to walk through the forest once again heading to Thalith’s temple to make her offering. The wind has picked back up and the many leaves begin to whip around her head in a circular dance. The leaves are too many now, blocking her vision ahead and between bits of space, Nabiyre can see , massive tree roots are beginning to rise from the underbrush.
While desperately tryung to fight away the leaves , a large but swift brance sweeps down catching her basket and throwing it across the forest floor. Roots snake up her legs, creaking and winding , spiraling around her waist and up to her shoulders, her throat is next. A thin but tight root wraps around her neck and the trees begin a violent dance of swaying with trunks lifting up and down pounding in an awful rhythm of pounding. A chorus of voices, shouting an unrecognizable language, many tongues and ancient nations.
The root begins to squeeze Nabiyre’s neck and she can no longer breathe. The trees of Sorrowbend woods were older than their Gods and a simple forest witch was simply no match. Nabiyres eyes begin to close, her body losing it once firm stance and in the distant she can hear the ferocious scream of a newborn and the smell of burning oak.
The roots loosen their grip on Nabiyre, letting her body slump to the forest floor in a thud. And through her half opened eyes she can see a bodyless single fire flame attacking the roots of the trees , their branches, bouncing off and on again so quickly, her eyes could not keep up. The trees fall back from Nabiyre, letting out an unheard of scream of pain that only the forest could recognize. Sap oozes from the trunks and branches, putting out the small fires started by the mysterious flame, light smoke and leaves blow as the trees slower than the eye can see move back into their positions.
Nabiyre laid on the forest ground for hours unconsciouse before finally being awakened by the cry of the baby that she heard right before the flame began. Cradled in a nest of branches and leaves lay a girl child, newborn, tiny and not yet ready to be born but yet she was here. No doubt she was left to the cruelty and fate of the elements, assuming that a baby so premature wouldn’t survive. Nabiyre had never heard a baby scream with such a powerful voice, a voice of strength, song and vengeance!
Nabiyre picked up the little baby who was no bigger than her hand, wrapped it in her woolen shawl and through skin to skin did Nabiyre see the soul and spirit of the baby. She saw smoke, fire, flames, anger and sorrow in her tiny heart. Nabiyre had the gift of seeing into the soul amongst other things , but this tiny wee creature had the God power of the FLAME! The trees made way for Nabiyre and the flame keeper, cleared out the underbrush and flattened lifted roots that could cause them to fall, offered their branches to help walk her up hills. Nabiyre stopped, remembering why she had even come this way in the first place.
“ I want my got damn basket back! With everything in it PLUS interest!”
The basket of offerings and magical herbs floated towards them laying itself gently at Nabiyres boots fuller than it had been before with every item doubled.
“ Hmm, sap suckers.”
#
THALITH’S TEMPLE
Nabiyre arrived at Thalith’s temple with the baby in here arms and the full baskets of goods and offerings. She induced her breasts to lactate to feed the child who suckled voraciously at her nipple. She layed down the offerings at the statue of the beloved forest goddess Thalith and in the faint whispers of the temple halls could she her the name Khadijah being recited over and over again.
“ Is that your name little one? Are you Khadijah?”
Looking down at the baby whose eyes are filled with flames and her tiny mouth spilling with milk, Nabirye is sure that she saw her smile. A tiny pinky fingers sticks straight up revealing the smallest of flames.
“It’s settled then. You shall be called Khadijah, she who was born too soon, but yet still on time. I will be your mother, as you have saved me, I vow to care for you for the rest of my days little flame keeper.”
Chapter 3
Sunderhelm – Land of Men
His name was Jacob, and in his mother’s tongue he was called Yakulb. He could no longer remember what his mother looked like and could scarcly remember the sound of her voice when she said his name. He hadn’t seen her since the Great Divide, since the time of the earth between man and woman split with enmity forever dividing their country into two gender segregated parts. As general of the army of Elysia, the old name of the country before the world split with hate, he was obligated to stay.
He had sworn himself to King Alaric and the creation of Sunderhelm. His mother on one side of the world and he on the other. Did she think about her son that she lost so long ago? He thought of her often and longed to feel the warm embrace of his mother’s arms around as when he was a child. Now her face is a blur, her voice is silence, her love absent.
He had sat for too long at this table in the council room, he had dismissed his men hours ago. He was surrounded by correspondences, letters with unbroken seals, and scrolls dropped off by Evangeline’s falcon’s. Messages and messengers. He only needed to read one to know what the others would say, and with each passing hour did the large oak counsel table fill up with more and more urgent letters. Jacob never brought anything to Alaric without proper fore thought, research, assuridity, confidence and proof. Alaric had grown colder over the past centuries, often responding with indifference and apathy.
Jacob would have to know how he wanted the outcome of this situtaiuon to end because ultimately he would be the one to make the final decisions. His once respected King, and friend, seemed no more than a casing of a monarch, a prop to reassure the men of the country that we are still stroing. Only Jacob knew the truth and the truth was a weight he no longer wished to carry.
One by one did he open every message just to be sure he didn’t miss anything. Letters from all over the country and even the underworld. Steaming with the heat of Hell still swarming around its edges. And just as he thought, they all said the same thing just in different variations. Some countries hoping to ally themselves to Sunderhelm with this surprising attack on Evangeline. Some bartering land in exchange for an opportunity to fight. Some threatening to release their own armies on Sunderhelm if the rumors are found to be true.
And one letter from Hela, expressing her extreme delight in the murder of the Old Ones of Evangeline. Jacob would wait longer before approaching Alaric. Neva’s name was a trigger that could set him off in unexpected ways that no one could forsee. Her name was never to be spoken, never to be brought up in conversation. Neva was never to be heard of.
#
“ I never ordered it.” Says King Alaric stuffing a small biscuit into his mouth. “And who was attacked exactly? Jacob you aren’t making yourself too clear. Its almost as if you are deliberately trying to hide something from me.” The king taps his glass alerting the servant standing at his dinner table to refill his wine goblet.
This indeed was the wrong time to approach Alaric, he was undoubtedly on his second bottle of wine and could be belligerent at times. But Jacob had no choice, time was running out and decisions had to be made. An army had to be assembled, men needed to be gathered, planning, maps , food , uniforms!
“ Your highness, it was Evangeline that has suffered this attack. “
“Evangeline! Who has been killed? What of … her…?
“It seems the attack was targeted at the elders, The Old Ones. Most of them have been wiped out, some remain.”
“Is she dead?”
“Is who dead your highness?”
“You know who Im referring to Jacob! Just tell me. Tell me !”
And with a deep sigh the over worked and underappreciated Jacob tells the King what wants to hear but doesn’t want to know.
“Neva, the Undying, Queen of the North lives.”
Jacob turns his head sideways , bracing him self for the kick back of the King’s fury, from the rage that comes when her name is spoken in his presence. There is only the crackling of the fire breaking open the wood in the hearth. Alaric is quiet. Jacob slowly turns his face back to the king to see his eyes staring into the fire, the shadows of the flames dancing across his face, as if inside that hearth is where all the answers can be found. He turns to look at Jacob who is puzzled by the lack of emotion, or the non reactory behavior of the news.
“ Continue on Jacob.”
His voice is sober now, as if he wasn’t three sheets to the wind before Jacob entered the room. It is even solem. Jacob cant conclude if this is joy or sadness Alaric is experiencing.
Laying down pieces of the arrows sent from Evangeline, Alaric examines them closely.
“ Black and gold arrows? These are Sunderhelm arrows! I swear to you on my crown, I didn’t order this!”
“Your highness, I know you didn’t order this and yes these are our colors. These arrows are a very good replica of Sunderhelm archery with the exception of one thing. Size.
Jacob holds up a Suderhelm arrow against the ones sent from Evangeline, blood and matter still attached to the spears.
“ Do you see , your highness? They are not our arrows. They are too small.”
Alaric holds both arrows side by side.
“ Too small indeed.”
“Assemble a small caravan. Men who can withstand the cold. Send them to the northern realm of Evangeline.” Said the Alaric.
“To what purpose, your highness? Is there a message we are to convey?”
“No need. I will be with you.”
#
Neva did not tread lightly in the snow as she walked with the reigns of her most beloved companion, Dove in her hands. She had no choice but to make slow and steady strides, through the knee deep snow. Unusually deep, even for the northern realm. She had rejected all assistance to get her back home, insisting she could make it there herself, and none of the elders having the nerve to stop her. She was born of snow and ice, but this was not normal weather for the northern realm. Dove neighed and hissed warm smoke from her nostrils. They had to stop eventually. She knew and could see soldriers from the land of men trailed her closely but kept their distance. The real question was, but for how long would they remain away.
Neva thought this before recklass, bold, stupid. They had already done so much damage and now they show their faces in her domain. She saw them and they saw her. The army of men did not attack but observed. By order of the King, she shall not be harmed, only watched and even the men grew tiresome of this frigid and arctic climate wondering what the Kings true intent was. Neva looked up to the mountain cliff to see one lone rider on black stallion that sharply contrasted against the snow covered mountains.
She couldn’t quite make out the face and she squinted her eyes, a mortal habit that she had yet to shake. The face of the man on the horse was familiar. Even from this distance could she make our the features. The handsome face of the only man she had ever loved. The face of the man she hated the most. The dreadful face of the man that she would have to kill. Alaric stared down at Neva, whom he had not seem in nearly one thousand years.
And even though he couldn’t see her close he could spot the beautiful one from miles away. His heart began to pound in an unnatural rhythm, too fast, he thought. The more he stared down at her the faster the beats became. Alaric fell from his horse, unconscious in the snow. Neva felt her own heart beat a rhythm, that it had not in centuries at the same time. The sight of each causing spasms in and currents in two dead hearts.
She felt so light suddenly, tired even, a sensation she had forgotten. Into the snow she falls off Dove who neighs in agony at the sight of her mistress falling. Neva’s body crunches down into the many feet off snow and ice, Dove also stuck, the snow becoming quick sand. Dove and Neva stopped moving, and both set off to dream.
I will die here. I will die in this very spot. My beloved and I. All of us buried under 10 feet of snow only to be revealed in the spring. But there is no spring in the northern realm you say. So we will never be found.
The thought of a finale filled Neva with an ease and lightness of spiritshe hadn’t known in centuries.
Chapter 4: