A Colonial Anabasis.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

A Colonial Anabasis.

by Marina and Christopher Purnell.

Chapter one.


Lajhama was a picturesque wreck of a city. The port district had been rebuilt and served as the main part of the town, with a cluster of very long wooden homes with bamboo-and-thatch roofs having once been in them; many had been burned during the landing by the inhabitants as they fled, leaving behind their charred remnants, the city on the furthest neck of the peninsula therefore being largely abandoned. A series of older stone structures, however, which lay mostly in ruins reflected of an earlier prosperity, though the one intact Hindoo temple had been burnt by the Spanish troops.

Further inland where the peninsula rose in size, however, a large hill rose out of the jungle, now largely cleared by the efforts of the expedition, with the ruins of the great old stone city to the west, and surmounting the hill, the great Citadel of Lajhama. The Citadel was in every way overwhelming, and imposing.

The hill was surrounded by a considerable moat of salt water, which was connected on either side to the sea, which necked off the peninsula as a sort of artificial island, making landward attack difficult, seeing as the Citadel commanded every approach; it also made avoiding the Citadel impossible, though that was not desireable anyway as it was close enough that regular rocket and mortar attacks could harass shipping in the harbour.

The walls, which were built slightly up the base of the hill, in such a fashion, however, that troops further up the slope could fire down to support the defenders on the walls, or to aid in retaking them should a section be seized, were immense, with massive and regulation crenulations.

The gates were topped with pagodas and there were huge regular stone piles in front of each gate, with the wooden bridges across the moat having been demolished. These stone piles were placed to resist artillery, it seemed, and had been quite effective in the task, preventing a direct attack on the gates when, especially, they had been piled with sand behind them to further resist the effect of modern guns in advance of the landings, perhaps when the old Citadel was revived by the strange Amazons of the land.

Further pagoda-marked turrets along the walls had resisted them for some time; but the walls themselves were now battered and knocked about in several places, and one huge section had been battered down by the continuous action of the guns, over a span of the three stubborn months of the siege, into a gentle slope which was now the primary object of the desperate defenders. They had only just, the day before, somehow repulsed by bringing guns in along the road atop the immense thick walls, to fire grape shot en enfilade from the intact sections of the wall as the columns pushed forward atop it.

A large and imposing castle and with it the highly arching pagoda of a Hindoo temple stood at the top of the hill with the walls of the citadel, and a series of structures were built into the hillsides, which were surely riven with countless underground tunnels, and it was through a lower one, which ran under the salt-water moat, that they received their water from further inland; the supply had been cut two weeks ago but they had apparently gathered enough reserves in their cistern that the want of it had not yet become apparent.

Having opened the breach acceptably, the guns were nontheless still widening it, after that morning a herald had been sent forward with the news that a general assault would be conducted on the leisure of the commander of the expedition; and should it succeed, the garrison ought be subject to all the depradations of a sack, the initial rush having failed. The offer to surrender was repeated, and yet for the moment there was no reply within the fortress.

The swallow-tailed pennant of the Amazonian Empress with its crank-tipped cross, called the Swastika and a traditional symbol of the Hindoos, done in crimsone against light blue, still waved defiantly over the castle at the top of the hill, and there was not, until a while following three hours after noon of the clock, any sign of life in the fortress except the return-fire of such guns as could still manage it occasionally being offered, though they were clearly to the stage of needing to conserve powder for the next assault.

It was finally at that point, that perhaps to the relief of all, for the stubbornness and tenacity of the siege had been wearying upon all, that the guns of the fort fell completely silent, and a small party on heavy horses--clearly artillery horses, it became apparent--holding up white flags came forward, and rode toward the bridges that the combat engineers of the French and Spanish had erected across the moat at the point of the breach, intending to cross. At last, after those long three months, the defenders were sending someone to parley.

Muskets followed the party coming out of the fortress, but they were handled by weary men in dusty coats acting on instinct rather than real suspicion. Jean Chretien de Lapniac, their captain, stood looking at them through his spyglass from the patrol line until satisfied. He folded the expensive optical piece in on itself, placing it back in the pocket of his dirty uniform coat, before shushing the men down.

Most brought their muskets wearily down, or even took to resting back on the ground as they had previously been, and the officer called for a messenger to deliver news of the parley attempt back through the lines to the commanders in the rear.

"Ride back the tent of Baron de Segur and inform him the garrison has sent a delegation," he firmly impressed upon the dispatch rider. With that out of the way he looked to find the fat Dutchman assigned to the approaches of the breach by order of the commanders as an interpretor.

"At your service, seigneur." Marius Verveer appeared at his side without warning, moving with a surprising haste for a man of his comfortable girth. A trader based out of Batavia, he had made a large profit helping to outfit the expedition with fresh food as it approached from India and had signed on to extent his fortune by acting as a freelance translator. He was rather swarthy as well as being rotund, presenting a flattering comparison to the fair-skinned, whipcord-lean young nobleman commanding him about.

De Lapniac did not bother to hide his irritation at the Dutchman, and pointed angrily to a pair of horses being held by the reins by his servant. "There is a parley to be challenged and escorted." Without bothering to explain further he approached the servant, grabbing an infantryman in passing to help him mount up the horse.

Once in the saddle he watched with unconcealed amusement as Verveer scrambled on top of his own beast, obviously uncomfortable with a horse. But he waited until the burgher was seated securely before trotting forward leisurely to go meet the Amazons only now emerging from their citadel. He had been bored for much of the siege, and an opportunity to meet the strange inhabitants of the land, who had resisted so tenaciously despite the weakness of their sex, promised some interest.

The party, in all, consisted of eight riders. They were of varying breeds; two of the women, looking awkward on horse, were immensely burly and somewhat tall, with the skin and features which marked them of the Maori subset of the Polynesian race. One was a delicate Chinese lady, of the Cantonese variety, who could scarcely be four feet, ten inches in height if her seated height was of any indication, and was wearing a pair of European-style glasses, perhaps to some surprise, and looking strangely dapper in long embroidered robes. The bearer of the white flag was black, pitch black and woolly haired like the inhabitants of Papua to the north. The other four, however, were clearly Malays.

Of the Malay women, they were all garbed and armoured with breastplate and corselet of armour and the heavy cast iron helmets of the sort that men of the last century might have worn in battle, when armour still counted for some things. They wore riding trousers of sheepskin and layered silk blouses. They were carrying swords, but otherwise the party was unarmed, and it was clearly a contingent of their officers, such as they were, seeing the contrast they presented with the other Amazons in the troop, who, with the exception of the Chinese woman, had on scale mail and elaborate fringed pantaloons only.

At the head of this party was a Duizhu, the rank here corresponding to the Chinese equivalent of what would ultimately be a captain, and indeed adopted from the Chinese, though she was only distantly aware of it. Mostly, Duizhu Tjandra Olphana sri Talingit was only distantly aware of the whole thing as the grinding of not having ridden in quite some time bore into her, as well as the intense hunger her body was suffering from.

The Duizhu stretched archly as she spied a party from the other lines as they crossed the wooden bridge under the guns, and navigated toward them with a gesture toward the other women. All were demoralized, and Tjandra herself doubted that she'd survive very long in captivity, were the enemy to prove merciless. But the negotiations were to be conducted to avoid that fate, after such a long siege in which it had appeared, in the end, the Raihiranya could not relieve them, or for some purpose had never intended to do so.

A striking assembly, de Lapniac commented to himself as he could see them clearly. Perhaps he looked as exotic to them as they did to him. In the white surcoat and breeches of the regimental uniform, wearing only a tricorne hat and hair hidden underneath a now poorly maintained and unpowdered wig, he presented a less martial picture than some of the armored amazons.

But he was an officer and the son of a nobleman, used to lording over rougher-hewn peasants, and bore himself rigidly in the posture of command. And at nearly six feet tall, he towered over most of the Amazons, which provided a bit of a boost in confidence. He was a conqueror, and fixed himself in habit and demeanor as a lord coming now to deliver justice and mercy in the haughty manner that his class had practiced ever since France had pretensions of civilization.

To his annoyance, though, Marius Verveer presented a completely different picture. The fat man was slouched in his saddle, present a distinctly unsoldierly appearance, and his riding was amateurish at best. Rather than risk an incident with the merchant embarrassing the dignity of the army he slowed down still further, pausing when he crossed over the bridge, and allowing the Amazonian delegation to come to him. As they approached, he issued his orders to the Dutchman. "Introduce me, and inquire of their purpose!"

The translator nudged his horse just a bit forward, positioning himself directly in front of the French captain. When the Amazonians had come to a respectable distance he addressed them in a soft tongue that de Lapniac was disturbed to hear coming from the rotund man, who normally spoke a rather guttural and unmelodic accented French.

Tjandra took her little party a few paces closer before reining in at the man's words. She seemed more than a bit relieved to hear comprehensible speech from him. "Inform His Honor the Gentleman De Lapniac," she answered, "That I am Her Honor the Captain Tjandra Olophana sri Talingit, of the garrison of the Citadel of Lajhama, and that I have been sent by Her Gracious Honor Colonel Lakshmi Prabha sri Wapai, commander of the garrison, to discuss with your commanders the terms for the cessation of the Citadel of Lajhama to your armies."

"As we thought," de Lapniac replied to himself, obviously pleased, as the Dutchman relayed the gist of the Amazonian officer's words to him. He removed his tricorne, holding it over his chest in a polite gesture of greeting. "Convey my pleasure to make her acquaintance, and tell her that I will escort her party through our lines to the commanders she will treat with."

Tjandra repeated the gesture, before the words had been conveyed, somewhat impressed by the honour, removing her own heavy helmet and emulating it as best she was able, before returning it. It was rather amazing, by the standards of women of Europe of some refinement, how lean and wiry those arms were, though surely the length of the siege contributed to it. "My thanks to His Honor," she answered. "We have the pleasure of having the trader Li Sunu in our presence who is fluent in the Spanish and the Portuguese, and also the Dutch, and knows some of the Latin and the French, so that we may communicate with some degree of regularity, though I am very pleased at the presence of one who knows the Bausa Kaetjha. Please let His Honor carry for us as he deems fit; we will follow.”

She nervously thought that, of all the party, Li Sunu was their main asset and the most likely to survive: the woman had been the chief of the Lajhama traders, and the city was mostly a trading post for goods with the Indies and the western peoples who now ruled them. She was fluent in Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese, and some Latin, and had made a passable effort at a bit of French, whereas Tjandra herself only knew some Dutch. And might soon enough be with her ancestresses, on the whimsy of the enemy.

De Lapniac nodded, somewhat interested that one of their traders, and it was obvious which one was the civilian, knew so many European tongues. They were not barbarians devoid of civilization to be sure, though their depredations against Spanish territories and the vessels of the King of France had brought the Bourbon powers into this joint expedition. And they had known ahead of time that the Amazons had close trade links to the Dutch, though it was presumed to have been rather one-sided and primitive trade.

The knowledge of Latin was unusually erudite for a non-European and he wondered if perhaps a priest had taught it to her. In any case, they were simply more sophisticated than expected which made the whole effort both more interesting and potentially more lucrative, which was an important consideration for the second son of an impoverished country marquis. But it also suggested, as if more proof were needed after the siege, the potential for prolonged organized resistance which the expedition might require regular reinforcement to overcome.

Still, he had his duty. He waved with his arm across the bridge, through the dirt track established by the engineers. "If my lady Tjandra would be so kind as to follow, I will lead her and her party back through our positions. Ask her to keep the white flag up as we transit past the enlisted men. We will proceed at a trot so that our purpose is not mistaken in any case, with myself visibly at their head." Marius translated for him, and as he finished de Lapniac directed his horse back around to cross the bridge.

"We understand perfectly," Tjandra answered simply, and followed as appropriate. There was nothing more to be done, and she loathed the banal desire within herself to hope that there would be some kind of food provided to them at the audience with the commanders. Their diet had, for too long, consisted entirely of very small amounts of rice with the occasional bit of vegetable and fruit grown inside the citadel, and the meat of slaughtered horses, but that had already run out, to be replaced by rat. Even the officers were feeling the pinch now, and this in what had always been a tropical land of bounty.

De Lapniac led them through the lines as promised, slowly down just a bit as he passed through the elements of his own company of fusiliers. The men stood aside respectfully for him, and looked at the Amazonians as they passed with undisguised curiosity. The heat of battle had not been a good place to make an impression of the strange enemy they had been called to conquer, and for many of them this was their first real sight of the Amazonians up-close. There was a forgiving air about the troops that he took in as he passed, a palatable relief that it would seemingly not be necessary to take the citadel by storm even if they were thus denied the rights they obtained in such a circumstance.

Once past the front lines they encountered the engineers and the artillery positions, with a similar reception as they passed by them. It became apparent as they entered the sprawling camp of canvas tents that the road divided the two armies, with the Spanish on the left of the road and the French on the right. The tents of the commanders were located in the middle of the sprawling encampment, where well-groomed officers milled about around a guard of tall grenadiers from both countries. Evidently the messenger de Lapniac had sent had notified de Segur, who was visible waiting at the entrance to his own spacious tent, where there was a table and accommodations for a council of war, now suitable for the discussion of a surrender.

Orderlies stepped forward as they reached the grenadier guardsmen, taking the reins of the horses and allowing the party to dismount. De Lapniac did so first, demonstrating that it would be required from his point to proceed on foot. He continued through to the immaculately attired knot of officers surrounding de Segur, before halting and making a salute to his assembled superiors.

"Captain Jean de Lapniac, escorting a party of Amazonian officers led by a captain Tjandra sri Talingit, who approached our lines under flag of truce and has communicated a desire to discuss terms of surrender," he reported.

Among the officers with de Segur was the Spanish commander, the Jaime Guzman y Spinola Marquis of la Mina, and the most eminent nobleman of the expedition, who presented an impressive figure in the impeccably maintained uniform of the Spanish Bourbons, yellow surcoat with red breeches. Joseph Dupleix, the bourgeois representative of the French Indian Company, seemed less impressive in stature and his uniform seemed no better maintained than de Lapniac's, but he was watching the expedition with a curious gaze. Alone among the officers he stood out for unmilitary bearing, but there was something about him suggesting he was the sharpest man among them.

"Thank you for your service, captain," Segur acknowledged. "And for bringing Heer Verveer with you. He will make a suitable translator for our conference. If you would, Marius, please make the introductions and invite them into my tent to address their proposals to a council of war drawn among the expedition. We will hear their terms openly and discuss them here."

The introductions were made, and Tjandra and the rest of her party bowed deeply, the three guards remaining outside as the four officers and Li Sunu were brought inside. The other three were Duisu, lieutenants, and clearly there simply to lend bulk to the meeting. They did respectfully remove their helmets inside, and doffing them, also bowed, and followed the directions given to them. Their armour, and rather flowing clothes, to some extent concealed the utter emaciation of their bodies, but they could not hide it from their faces.

"We should look to the needs of our guests, my lord Segur," Dupleix suggested, and looked over at his own Indian servants. "Refreshments are in order, and my men can provide a repast these Kaetjahsti will find familiar enough."

It had been a long siege and even the delicacies of the officers were mostly gone, which meant they had to rely on local ingredients and forage for fresh food. Segur hardly wanted to assail his guests with salt-pork and hardtack, so he nodded his acceptance. "Marius, tell them we will be providing a dinner before negotiations begin. Provided my lord Spinola concurs?"

The Spaniard smiled indulgently, his aristocratic hauteur eclipsing that of everyone else in the tent. "I have found wine to be an important part of negotiations in the past." He chuckled, enjoying a private joke he had no intention of sharing. "By all means. Fortunately we have no more beef with which to horrify their sensibilities, and so we can leave it up to Monsieur Dupleix's heathen servants to provide for us."

Marius translated, albeit leaving out the parts the Kaetjhasti were likely to find offensive or incomprehensible. Meanwhile Dupleix left to oversee his servants, and Spinola gave orders to bring a bottle of Madeira for the enjoyment of the officers.

Tjandra started speaking, which would surprise Spinola doubtlessly with Li Sunu's mastery of Spanish as she flawlessly translated: "If Your Honors my trouble the interruption, Her Honor the Captain sri Talingit must compliment you on the fineness of your artillery and the excellent fashion in which it was handled and employed. She says the officers of the garrison did not expect you to so easily demolish the walls, and had hoped to maintain resistance for six months, albeit at considerable privation."

Spinola was not surprised, though he was placed a bit on guard that one of the Amazons who knew Spanish was in his very presence. But an ambassador and courtier knew how to shield his thoughts and emotions, and he merely smiled grandly and with the appropriate aristocratic politesse, seemingly pleased with the development. "Please let her honor know that the resistance of this fortress has been spirited and has held to the utmost of human effort, with no cause for shame on the part of the garrison as events have developed."

"Thank you," Tjandra offered softly for Li to translate. "We officers of the garrison are all ksatra, high-born warriors of the Empress who is the Sun, hail to Her, and we do not doubt that we have shown honour to She to whom we owe our dignities. Do not doubt, Your Honor, that our resistance is unexceptional and customary rather than unique. We resist... On account of the fervent desire to defend our gods and the graves of our ancestresses in our motherlines, besides to uphold the honour of She Who Is The Sun, and our only regret is that relief didn't come."


"The capitulation of the Citadel to your force is now, we will acknowledge, inevitable, and for the honour you have shown us so far we are encouraged to your magnaminity,” she perhaps hesitantly concluded.

Not all of the nuances got through to the assembled Europeans, but enough did to communicate the main points of her statement. Most nodded thoughtfully, or pretended to do so. "Our countries have come to your lands to end attacks upon our shipping and overseas territories, but we will always honor opponents who prove honorable," de Segur answered. "You have earned the right to nominate terms of your capitulation and we will attempt to avoid any personal humiliation or shame to your officers. We shall begin immediately once you have sated your hunger, so as to move quickly to avoid further unnecessary suffering in your citadel."

"It is our personal duty to protect those of the unwarlike castes, Your Honor," Tjandra answered. "That is our first concern. I thank you very kindly for the food, it is deeply appreciated. As for the custom of raiding I cannot speak much, being only an officer of artillery here. But conduct war according to the long established principles of honour in our religion, and in this we share a common difference from the savage peoples of the Earth who do not know restraints or boundaries in their pursuit of victory."

Li Sunu herself added: "If I may be so bold, Your Honor, to speak in my own words, Grotius has long been translated into Bausa Kaetjha by the Dutch at our request and the expectations of the states of Christendom out of their opponents is understood and respected by the officers of The Empress who is the Sun, within our capacity to divine them."

"That will materially assist the negotiations we will conduct with your Empress," Spinola replied offhandedlly, and to some extent deceptively. Their Majesties had intended the expedition to conquer the land, but since their powers of resistance had clearly been underestimated despite the careful planning and overwhelming force brought to bear, it could be an honest statement after all. Still, if they could destroy the Empress' armies and take her capital the Marquis remained confident that negotiating surrenders would be the only use of his diplomatic experience.

Dupleix had in the meantime returned with his servants, who began loading a tray with platters of boiled rice. Vegetables and stews followed with spiced, minced pork brought in at the end. Fresh bread and long-preserved cheese were the only concessions made to the European palate, the carefully-hoarded remnants of more flour and provisions brought from French India. Dried and fresh fruits rounded out a set of dishes as exotic to the Europeans as their guests were.

Fortunately they were more comfortable to the Kaetjhasti, who saw them with incredible relief. To, indeed, see their faces then made them forget almost entirely their unfortunate position, and there was a soft bit of chatter between some of the officers in their own language, whereas previously they had been miserably silent. "Our thanks to Your Honors very exceedingly," Li Sunu translated a bit awkwardly when Tjandra spoke again. "That you have given us such bounty as to include pork, second-finest of all meats only to lamb; and that we are relieved to know that you do not share the prohibitation against its consumption which bedevils the Moros who have long usurped the Malay lands."

"We are pleased that you appreciate our poor efforts," Dupleix responded tactfully. "We have found that pigs are the hardiest of meat animals, even in this area. Boars would probably make for good hunting in the area if we had the time for such diversions. I confess that your other staples are mostly unfamiliar to us, but we have the good fortune to have many good Hindu servants from India among our train who have managed to make do."

"Boar-hunting is a fine sport and I've done it before in my own life, though the birds were my grandmother's because it's very hard to train them well enough to take such large prey and so we only had three able to make the attack on those trips," Tjandra answered through Li Sunu, with a sad sort of fond smile crossing her lips as she led her personnel into eating with the foreign officers. They were certainly utterly relieved for the opportunity!

Most of the European officers had grown familiar enough with rice to handle it with forks, though among the ranks fingers alone sufficed and that when the peasants were willing to try it rather than hardtack. But the company was among the most sophisticated in the hemisphere at the moment, a collection of high nobility from two realms, with all of the advantages that brought. Including the return of the Marquis' servants with bottles of sweet Madeira wine, offered in crystal glasses that hinted at the luxury available even on campaign. "It's not as dry as I prefer to go with a meal," Spinola apologized, "but only a wine fortified with other spirits can survive a long ocean voyage in the tropics."

The meal went on from there in a strange sort of twilight land, both of the setting sun in the tropics, and of the uncertainties of the party of negotiation in the camp of a strange and foreign people, whose blind hunger overwhelmed any further weariness at the moment. Their struggle was over, besides, and if the mercy of the enemy was in the least bit accurate they might again see the homes of their motherlines. But for the Franco-Spanish Army, the March Up-Country into the land of the Amazons had just begun.

[Simon_Jester]

Hurray! A Kaetie story!

This would be set around what, 1725-50? You've got a French India and a Bourbon Spain, after all.

I question the accuracy of calling this an Anabasis, though, since the Franco-Spanish forces are still on the offensive... for now. Ah, well, we can always get more accuracy later.

[Thanas]

Most interesting and an excellent read. At the moment, I am just wondering who the strategoi who end up being muredered will be....

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Anabasis is often rendered as the "March Up-Country" ; Xenophon's use of it was actually somewhat inaccurate, Cyrus' advance into the interior being the Anabasis but the majority of the original work being devoted to the katabasis, and The Anabasis of Alexander was a more perfect useage of the term as I understand it.

Anyway, for those who haven't been following the background materials I shall post a map shortly showing the old Royal Road of Great Lajhama and the villages under the sway of the Rauhiranya in the far west. I'll reveal the exact date in the next chapter, but it's the 1730s.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Chapter two.



It was in the midst of one of the grand old wrecked Wats or temples that de Lapniac had taken to exploring, with the fading remnants of their dashed and ruined pagan idols, in some long-distance cataclysm, stewn here and there. The great number of these structures, which contributed to the incredibly picturesque wreck of the city, had been evident from the sea, thrusting up out of the trees and covered by vines.

Here, too, vines clung to the walls in places in the midst of the Wat, though in others it seemed they had been recently cleared, and in some cleared places writing carved in stone accompanied the innumerable pagan bas-reliefs. To travel through the interior walls was strangely mysterious, let alone the interior courtyard with the great banyan trees growing in it, and the ruined and toppled stone which scarcely made an impressive against the still greater mass which remained intact.

Beyond the central great courtyard, however, were a series of lesser courtyards to be found on more thorough exploration, and here, lightly shaded by the high towers, there were a variety of picturesque pools. Perhaps they were for bathing in some forgotten age, or perhaps for some other more sinister purpose, and only now filled up with water and their earlier useage obscured. That could not be told so easily, and de Lapniac did not have the authority to order a clearing and more substantial reconstruction of the ruins, though their grandeur nonetheless seemed to recommend it.

The ruins seemed to be at the least centuries old, and little used if at all since then. That they were anything other than the wreck of the civilization which the strange Amazons of this land of Australia had grown up in the midst of, seemed unlikely. Nonetheless, haunting, faintly, seemed to be the sounds of giggling, girlish laughter beyond; it rippled up through the walls and halls from one of the lesser courtyards, and seemed almost ghostly, and yet coherent and lasting enough that it might well not, in fact, be a trick of the imagination.

The sound drew the interest of de Lapniac, drawing him away from a relief of dancing figures that had reminded him of some illustrations from far-away India. His valet Pierre looked a bit spooked, and the sound was eerie here in the ruins, but as a gentleman he was supposed to be immune to fear. He did grasp the hilt of his rapier instinctively, but calmed himself down and turned toward the source, toward another one of the overgrown courtyards. "It is nothing more than some children playing in the ruins, dolt," he rebuked. He stood a moment longer before the relief, trying to insure that he could reproduce it accurately later, before moving on to investigate the disturbance.

But it wasn't anything as trivial as some playing children. As he followed his way into the courtyard, this one had been neatly cleaned, in fact, and some of the faded and chipped paint of the idolatrous scenes on the walls was in the process of being almost delicately restored, perhaps not by proper paint, but some sort of dyes or another. Yet, prominently dominating was the scene in the courtyard; for here the pool had been cleaned out, and the water was clear, and most importantly, there were three figures in it.

They were women, naked Malay women, of lithe, wiry bodies and small breasts, red dots prominently tatooed on their foreheads, and dark, dark lush eyes and long hair, clean and brilliant in the cool water against the shaded heat of the day, languid in the pool. Another three women, with more fat on their bodies and less attuned to vigour, were quietly going back about far more feminine tasks in a few rooms of one of the warrens of passageways which interconnected the various grand pagoda-like structures of the temple complex. Well, not really rooms: the open passageways there had been closed off by heavy tarpulins or drapes, or else could be, in a pinch of notice, and there were some other efforts clearly being made at establishing a regular sort of household in the ruins.

The sounds of de Lapniac's boots were heard, however, as he entered and gazed upon the scene. The eyes of one of the women in the pool flicked to him, sharp and attentive, and she rolled to the side of the pool immediately and without hesitation and snatched up a distinctive keris with seven long and sinuous waves in its blade, wickedly intended to cause as much damage as humanly possible in a single thrust. Then she caught sight more carefully of his wig and other accrutements, which suggested he was a man of refinement, and the shout of alarm, which turned the attention of the serving women, changed to a rapid fire exchange between the women, who seemed shameless in his presence and more concerned with a potential threat than with their modesty.

Having stumbled upon the scene de Lapniac froze in mid-stride as he processed the scene. Such a circumstance would be unthinkable with European women (except, of course, when it wasn't, such as in a love-affair at court); and it was certainly unexpected. There had been no sign that the ruins had been inhabited, at least from the outside. They resembled another three that de Lapniac had already explored after breakfast. Still, there was one course of action open to him, and he doffed his tricorne while bowing from the waist, and backed off a bit muttering apologies in a language they would not understand simply because he was not thinking about the context of the scene. But he did not close his eyes, or move with undue haste, remaining instead poised and collected.

His valet was less respectful and did not bother to hide his appreciative gaze on the women, though he knew full-well the consequences of acting upon that interest. That shook Jean out of his momentary shock, and he hit Pierre with the brim of his hat. "Oaf! Show some sign of manners, even if you have no breeding. We withdraw out of the courtyard, and don't even think about..."

"Your Honor? We have not caused offense?" The voice echoed hesitantly in latin, and a moment later one of the shorter of the girls and, it was hard to tell how mature or not, slipped through, already having donned with a sarong with a sort of robe pulled over her upper body that she was still working to tie. "I am Aditi Sukhani," the words came as odd contrast to the latin speech, "of the priestess caste and an officer of Her Majesty who is the Sun," she added.

"We priestess-officers of the garrison who were paroled, and we were told we might also go to the old city... Is there something amiss with where we've taken up residence? We did it only to not incur ritual impurity from living in the houses of those of a low caste." She bowed low, seeming to show great fear that she'd caused offense, or violated the terms of their parole.

De Lapniac did not think he could be more surprised by the courtyard, but the oddly lyrical expression of Latin was among the last things he expected. But he was an educated man, and had learned the classical tongue of Rome, even if he was better writing it than speaking it. The surprise wore off, and he had his wits about him. "You have give no offense, madam. I was simply not expecting to find anyone here in these... structures. They seem to have been abandoned for some time and there was no sign of inhabitants. It is I that must apologize for intruding upon you." And of course women should be shocked at a man coming unannounced in their presence and seeing them indecently, but as with so much else the Amazons were not normal women.

"They were abandoned for many centuries," Aditi agreed readily. "And have not been inhabited in many centuries by any person. But they are still sacred ground for us, and with the temple of the city destroyed by your Christians, and the temple of the fortress abandoned also, we have no ground which is ritually pure for us to sleep upon, for the daughters of priestesses, even if they are not priestesses, must behaving according to the tenets of priestesses and conduct themselves in an appropriate fashion. And this means that our homes must be the abodes of the gods, or else otherwise blessed, and that the impure occupations of others may not be allowed to sully them.

“So only the servants we have ritually purified to serve us have accompanied us, and we resolved to go off here to the old town, and quietly live among the ruins on gathered fruits and nuts and such as the village people will bring us, until your people are driven out, or we are put to death, or some other fate befalls us. I know that the customs of your priests are different, as I learned them at the same time I learned your religious speech, from a Bishop Pietro of the Jesuits who represented the Christians of Timor when I was an officer in our garrison there. It had been my duty on the isle of the Crocodile God to see to their needs as given to me by the Govenor of that place, since she fancied that as one of the priestly caste myself, I would know best how to deal with those who looked to their priestly caste to rule them, as it seems that Christians do when you, of your kshatra, warriors, are not about to guide them."

De Lapniac had no trouble following Aditi despite the unusual circumstances and her exotically spoken Latin. He was at least passingly familiar with the tenants of Hindoo belief and some time around Dupleix had given him an idea of their caste system. It seemed the Amazons followed the Indians in a great many things, and it occurred to him to look into such connections among the coolies and servants and sepoys brought from that country. But here was a rare opportunity to converse directly with one of the Amazons! And one who would know a great deal about the nature and origins of their society, customs, and that Hindoo-like religion that seemed omnipresent in the ruined city.


"Our peasants look naturally to their priests, it's true," he confirmed. And it could be irksome when the parish priest was either highly sincere or completely corrupt. "Your customs seem closely related to those of our Indian subjects, and I confess I would count myself fortunate if you could explain some of them to me. But first, I hope I have not established a contamination here? The rules of ritual purity, yours and those of the Indians, are not known to me and I do not wish to violate them through accident."

"You would have only contaminated this place had you entered the pool, or our sleeping quarters, at which point the result would be frightly," Aditi admitted, "But we can sit alongside the pool, assuming we may account you kshatra, which I think proper, and that you have not consumed the flesh of sacred animals on this day, which I think not, for I have heard you did not bring any poor cows along to be butchered as your people do. This was long a sad and terrible thing, for it would inevitably lead to violence on Timor when it took place, and it seemed so silly that in the end I used my own family's wealth to buy certain numbers of sheep for the Christians so that they would stop slaughtering thier cows, and thus terrifying our settlers so frightfully, for we have good reason to be fearful of the god-wrath that comes from such violations," she completed with some considerable circumlocution, and gestured beyond the verge. "Come, I am sure that Deepti and Indrani have retired by now, not having a need to be fearful."

"Thank you for your invitation. No, I have not had beef for quite some time." He looked around for a likely spot to settle down upon, and joining the interesting little Amazonian girl. Of course, there was something else to deal with. "Wait for me outside the entrance we came by," he ordered Pierre, in French. The less refined valet had lost most of his interest with the clothing of Aditi and the departure of the other women anyway, and so left without any malingering. "I have sent away my servant, who is not high-born," he explained to the Amazon.

"That is a considerably assiduous kindness," Aditi answered, sitting and drawing her robes a bit tighter, before addressing something in her native tongue to the others, where the curtains were now drawn on the far side of the pool. She was positioned so that the sun fell against her hair to dry it slowly, and her eyes focused back on de Lapniac with thoughtful intelligence.

"So, yes, I am somewhat aware of the customs of western religion, and I know that the sacred home of the Mahabharat is very distant, for that matter,” she used an untranslateable word, that didn't even sound similar to their lilting language anyway. "That your servants are from this land, surprises me not, though it had long been fancied that we might be the last worshippers of the gods, and the Moros had overtaken all the others, but I know that some recent voyages have reached lands where the faith of our ancestors is still professed. We have grown to be a daring people on the sea, and it seems it is time to pay the price for that in blood."

De Lapniac was not particularly interested in the rationales of the expedition, but he nodded his head to confirm it before sitting down a respectful distance from the priestess-warrior. "Your people have harried the ships and lands of our allies, much as the Moors themselves are wont to do. This has made war against your people justified under the natural law of nations, which does not rest on any particular religious basis." He shrugged, and forbore to mention that they had also been assumed an easy conquest, a source of spices and wealth to break the Dutch and English, and that as heathens a Christian king would be justified in waging war on them in any case. Besides, he found himself warming to the rather charming Amazons, who bore little real relation to their barbarous and savage namesakes.

"You have many leagues to march, Your Honor, and we were but the westernmost land outpost of a vast Empire," Aditi answered lyrically. "The Gods and Fate and Right will decide, in the end, who overcomes, when your army spans those great distances. It is not my place to be concerned, anymore, though, about what I can no long affect, just to hope that I am some-day reunited with my mother and my aunts and all of my kin. It does please me, though, that even if that does not come to pass, there will be a little remnant of myself in this place--a bit of repair work in the ages of decay in the sacred places of Lajhama." She smiled, contentedly. "I do not think Kali will abandon us so readily, though, when we are a source of such sacrifice to Her."

"Kali." Jean picked out the unfamiliar, foreign word, recognizing it as the name of a major deity of the Indians. It does seem as though they have not just the outward style of the Hindoo religion but most of the theology, he decided. "What manner of sacrifices do you offer to this goddess? I have heard tales of Indian bandits that strangle travellers in her honor, and of widows burned alive in sacrifice, during my short time in her homeland."

Aditi turned very visibly sad at that: "Many of our children, are dead at birth, mangled and ill-formed, far, far more than once were. These are taken by the Rakshasas of Kali who is named Purani, she who in our legends is the cause of why we live, and why those poor children, who never once take a breath outside the womb, are the bloody harvest of Kali in payment for our survival."

He hid his shock and disgust at the first thought that came to mind, retaining that impassive face that had been a necessity among his peers in Paris. A goddess who made sacrifices of children, though! An abomination of Moloch, but he had seen no evidence of fire-pits. The way she described it sounded as though they suffered from many miscarriages of pregnancy, though, not an intentional act, and perhaps the goddess's picque was how they explained it? He would make a note of this tale and not believe the worst so readily. "What manner of terrible events did your people pay such a price for survival against?"

"As I explained before, we have reason to fear the consumption of holy animals. You see, some four score years after the Armada of the Great Emperor of Sina came to us, and landed many settlers among us in distant Tingfuéh, we used the ships he had given us, to explore far and wide. And in those days, we had men, and Kings as you do, and our families were like your's, and we were little different from the people of the western islands you call the Indies, save that we retained the Hindoo faith, and the Moros had made them also Moros by point of sword. But some of the men, in those days, were very impious, and so when they landed on a far southern island, they ignored the warnings given to them, and slaughtered and ate some cattle which were held as the sacred herd of Kali.

"This enraged Kali, and so she struck these men with a plague, which they carried back to all of our people, which drove the men mad, and made everyone barren," Akiti continued, the story being very familiar to her. "So it was that a Brahmin, a priestess named Purani who was a seeress, went questing in her dreams to find the source of this terrible plague, which made brothers kill each other in desperate, quivering madness, and run about the land and cause chaos, and for no children to ever be born."

"It was on her quest through the magic realms of the dreamlands, that she learned the cause of the plague, and so resolved to save us, in the only way she knew how. She ascended to a place holy to Kali, and there had a great pile of wood and bundles of leaves prepared around her, and there, without restraint, knelt on this pyre was it was set alight, and while she burned, prayed to Kali, that the great dread goddess of death and pestilience and rebirth and cleansing, would take her as a sacrifice, if only that Kali would restore to the women of the lands of the east, the ability to have children that they had lost, since they were blameless, as it was only the men which had eaten of Kali's sacred herd.

"Kali, praise to her, heeded her words; but Kali is a dreadful goddess indeed. She took Purani up, and told her that she would indeed give the women of the lands of the east the ability to procreate without their sinful men, if they would raise many temples to her, and if Purani herself, would be thus transformed into a Rakshasa, with the terrible duty of reaping in the womb so that so many of our children, born of this boon of Kali, instead of being born healthy, are born already dead as I explained. And so this is how our land came about, without men in it, and where women reproduce children who are like themselves, because the quickening and vital effort of the man is not there to create uniqueness in the seed of life."

The legend reminded de Lapniac of the voyage of Odysseus to some extent, and the terrible vengeance meted out on behalf of the sun god's cattle there. But it certainly explained the vigor of the prohibition against slaughtering cattle here in this land, more comprehensive than even that of India. And the method of reproduction suggested, for whatever reason, some force had expunged their men from the reproductive cycle.

"That is most interesting," he said, without voicing the skepticism he felt at ascribing their unusual condition to a cattle raid. "It does explain some matters that have puzzled me. Would you please indulge my curiosity a bit further? I would hear much more about your religion, and about how you have adapted your family and customs to deal with your unique condition. Perhaps more than can be conveyed in an afternoon."

"I would be very glad to tell you all that time and your interest might indulge," Aditi answered softly, leaning back, and unconcerned by the whole situation. But then the Amazons had tended to take the whole thing with a certain measure of resignment, it seemed. "I have little better to do, after all, and it would please me to think that all I should know, will be remembered by another. Anyway, in the same way that I tried to learn how not to mistreat the Christians of Timor, so perhaps you will learn how to fairly govern our people, for however long you find yourselves in command of the western reaches."

"Their Majesties will seek to rule justly over their subjects," de Lapniac responded, not really interested in discussing the future. He mulled over the brahmin's words in silence, and the sudden halt of their conversation reminded him of the time. Shadows had grown longer, in any case. "Thank you for indulging my curiosity, madam. I do not wish to detain you the whole day, if you have matters to attend to. You have been most enlightening about your people and I would like to continue such discussions, and if possible to learn your language. May I call upon you yet again tomorrow, or some later date?"

"I would be honoured to teach you our tongue; you may certainly return tomorrow, at perhaps around the same time as you arrived today, so that we may have bathed and so on before you arrive?" Aditi herself was merely greatly relieved things had gone well, and that the man across from her had evidenced such a love and interest in the knowledge of her people.

He laughed a bit at the request; he had certainly not intended to come across them bathing, though neither did he particularly regret it. "I had no intention of disturbing your baths today. Certainly none tomorrow. You have my appreciation for your generosity in humoring my idleness." He rose back up on his feet, bowing lightly again placing his hat back upon his wig. Adieu, he bade her.

"May the Lord Ganesh watch over the prosperity of your family, and Kali stay the hand of sickness from your sleep!" That voice echoed across the ancient halls as she leapt to her feet and bowed expansively as de Lapniac retreated from the scene, her dried hair flinging wildly and brilliantly behind her with a youthful exhuberence and restored spirit as she offered all the kindness she could manage to her erstwhile conquerors.


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The great city of Kaenura was a strange, bustling collection of European and Chinese architecture toward the waterfront and more traditional Malay wood houses toward the rear, dotted throughout with grand stone Wats and little fortified places and crazed temples of many levels of endless painted idols. And the midst of all that bustling mass of humanity in the Amazonian capitol stood its grand citadel, unlike that of Lajhama more than a fortress, and in fact now the centre of administration for a vast Empire founded on the designs of Dutch ships and Dutch guns and paid for in spice and gold, pearls and opals.

The palace of the Maharani of Kaetjh, Lajhama, and the Maori Lands, called the Rauhiranya by her idolatrous subjects, was a low stone pile for the most part, with fortified outer walls as it was based in the old, pre-collapse Citadel of Kaenura. There was one restored section of the palace which was in imitation of the grand Chinese palatial style, and had a Chinese scholar's garden attached. There was also a series of grand old wooden long-houses, like the Malays sometimes built, looking like huge ships, in addition to that, and then there was the restored old stone pile of the fortress itself, the grand Wat temple which contained the various dynastic shrines with a series of lesser ones around it for various ceremonial functions, and two new buildings.

There was also a large domed private bath for the Rauhiranya, which had been built by Dutch architects, the same ones who had overseen the construction of a cozy imitation of the Noordeinde Palace of the Stadtholders in The Hague for the Rauhiranya, which was her current personal residence. A third and final long building in the baroque style housed various offices of state. However, the throne room was unsurprisingly in the Chinese sections of the rather multiculturally crazed maze which made up the Imperial palace grounds in the city of Kaenura.

To this, the emissary of the Grand Pensionary of the United Netherlands had been duly issued a summons, on May 17th of the Year of Our Lord, 1737, to discuss matters of 'mutual import' as the circumloquitious missif had noted, though the impact of recent events would leave little doubt about what was to be discussed. The Netherlands was the only state to maintain a regular emissary at the court, but they were also an importand ally, and business at the naval dockyards, also built in the Dutch style, had over the past months rapidly increased; why, was certainly not a secret.

The Rauhiranya demanded no kow-towing or another extreme measures of obesiance, Yasovati having virtually formulated the method of her monarchy in the presence of European advisers. The court was more ostentatious, covered in numerous gems and precious metal and fine teak carving on the interior, than any European court would be. The ceremony itself, however, was not particularly ostentation, with the female guards and courtiers bustling about in various importance in their robes, and the low dais on which the throne set, being covered in gold to gleam like a brilliant solar disk around it, the throne itself having a Naga, half-snake being, with the scales marked in jade and the eyes the prized black opals of the southlands, and the eyes of the winged-man who represented the eagles, on the left side, the Naga on the right, to represent Arjunasti and Nagasti respectively; with the feathers of the wings of the bird-man making up the left side of the throne, being of gold for highlands and gems of topaz in the main to contrast with the jade on the other side.

The woman herself who sat on the throne was of no slight stature, being about five and a half feet tall, and her skin a particularly pale shade by Malay standards, and her facial features not indeed betraying much in the way of Malay influence, such that she looked somewhere between a high Malay Rani, and a the finest of a Raja's wives in India proper, with the excellent features they possessed, seeming to suggest her family had descended from some long line of conquering Indian nobles who had brought the Hindoo faith to this land, before the strange events which made it an abode of Amazons.

She was prominently dressed, today, in the black uniform of her guards, which was intended to ominously reflect her intent to wage war; unlike those foot guards, however, who wore long billowing skirts, she had black pantaloons upon her body, almost in the style of the Persians save their colour, and the blouse and vest were done with golden buttons, the jacket with the finest silver tassle, and over it all, held in place by a golden cord, was a brilliant light blue long cape flung back over the throne, with her hair held in place by a hairpiece, which bore on it an enormous opal of unknown worth, sensibly and simply pulled back; customary golden bracelets with various opals, of the upper classes, marked her wrists, and a gauzy net covered her hair, which had woven through it a silver diadem with a ruby at its center what it crossed her forehead. The boots she wore were simply European cavalry boots, but they had golden spurs and golden toe-sheaths over them.

She was the age of about thirty years, this Sita, and had taken the throne three years prior in 1734, and proceeded with the usual aggression and ability that had so far marked her family with only the smallest wavers. Her manner was peremptory, and her intelligence reflected in features which were, by no means, unattractive, as she waited in rigidly posed confidence for the present of the Dutch emissary.

Maurits Frederiks made his entrance alone, and with little sign of being impressed by his surroundings. The forty year old merchant had spent two years at his post and was thoroughly familiar with the pageantry of the Kaetjhasti. But he was wearing a fine blue surcoat with new brown breeches, and had carefully powdered and prepared his wig, so as to present a respectful figure before the imposing monarch. He stood taller than the women and cut an imposing figure despite incipient stoutness of late middle age, and yet moved with some of the ambition and drive that had made him a fortune in the spice trade as a younger man. He halted at the prescribed distance from the throne, taking the polite bow expected of a European emissary, before addressing the throne.

"I have received the summons of your Majesty and beg leave to inquire as to the purpose thereof." That was a formality, of course. He knew what the Empress had on her mind, and intended to do whatever he could to encourage her to resistance.

"We have, you know well, had Our lands invaded by the French, and Spanish, the Brother-Kings of the Gauls and the Iberians, in combination," Sita spoke excellent Dutch, and French and Latin as well, as did most of the members of the Imperial household. "Verily for the past three months Our fortress at Lajhama has held them off while We organized the military and refitted the dockyards and fleet and called numerous merchant ships to Our service and armed them in preparation for the conflict.

“Unfortunately We have just received word that after eighty-seven days the surrender of the Citadel of Lajhama was compelled after a great breach was forced into the walls, and following the repel of the first assault, a threat was made that the next assault should put the defenders to the sword, if they did not surrender, so they did. All of this was reported to us by some civilians and senior irregular officers who were allowed to leave the city, and reported hence to the dragoons who still maintain their position in the highlands to the east of the city and via the roads thence.

"Though this unfortunate, We do not begrudge the surrender of the garrison after such a long and brave resistance. Beside, it gives Us knowledge that the enemy fleet consists of about thirty sail of warships, give or take by some numbers, though many very heavy, and that the enemy has landed perhaps twenty-thousand muskets, five thousand horse, and a hundred guns siege and field to carry on this expedition. This is a very serious invasion force which We think probably intends to repeat against Us the feats of Alexander, Caesar, and Cortez."

"In light of this We intend to show the Spaniards, whose possessions We can more easily attack than those of the French, that We intend to treat this as a proper war. Therefore a fleet of two of our heaviest warships, and twelve Indiamen armed as warships, has been prepared and will be sent through the southern islands to Peru at the first opportunity with fifteen hundred troops aboard to burn their towns, in retaliation for the burning of Our towns. We are in the meantime also outfitting a much larger expedition of thirty sail armed, plus more transports, which We intend to send against Manila."

"That is the reason We have summoned you--We have no desire to hold Manila Ourself. Tell the Grand Pensionary and the Estates, that if they enters the war alongside Us, We shall give them Manila when We take it, and We are also willing to discuss the recognition of a Dutch right to the western part of what you call Papua Minor, which Our family has claimed but never attempted to settle. These, besides a reasonable payment in various specie, would be what We are prepared to offer if the United Netherlands will make war upon the Spanish and French with Us."

Now this was a tricky matter indeed. On the one hand, he had no desire to discourage the Empress in her resistance. But on the other, there was no chance of such an alliance being accepted at this time. "Your Majesty's offer is very generous, and I will communicate it to the Grand Pensionary and the estates of the Netherlands immediately. We desire no extension of Spanish or French power, and the East India Company will act to limit what supplies their expedition can draw from outside your realms."

That was the positive opening. Now for the downer. "At this time a major war in Europe has just ended, and few nations will wish to see it renewed. Our country is strong, but it cannot act forcefully against the French without knowing ahead of time of the position of the English. They have sided against us out of jealousy in the past, and if we are not able to be certain of their attitude we will have to move cautiously so as not to be taken by surprise if they attack us as well." Which was technically true, but just an excuse to provide a reason for inaction.

"You are afraid," Sita answered with some considerable observance, "of the overwhelming power of the Spanish and the French in combination, making attacks against you in Europe. We will therefore offer to send twenty-five of Our best warships and the Black Guards, as well as one hundred field guns, to you in Europe. As We have seen your armies operate at great distance from home, so We are confident that Our's can as well, and We can spare eight thousand troops, fourty-five hundred Marines, and a hundred guns, beside twenty-five sail, without compromising what We intend to effect against the French and Spanish expeditionary force.

“They have underestimated, We think, the actual strength of Our realms, and We can do all of this, and still defeat them, when the tropical diseases have taken the usual toll on your more northerly constitutions. We will still be able to, come to it, muster sixty-thousand troops to oppose them at the Pass of Chennupur, besides another fifty thousand under Governor Kosarji of the Western Lands to harass them on the way there, and more reserves and reinforcement would be in the offering behind this, even with the other commitments We have outlined. Would this, perhaps, encourage your Estates to act?"

"Your forces are best employed here, your Majesty, where a decisive victory can end this war far more quickly than events in Europe will," he answered directly. "If the English are inclined to war with Spain and France they will make no difference to the fighting there. And if the English are inclined to war with us, they will not be able to arrive to our aid without being intercepted. The geography simply prevents any other outcome." It was a thin line, trying to depress the Empress' hopes without admitting to just how weak the Netherlands had become after the close of the last century, and also to avoid explaining to her face precisely how little her fleet, though large, really meant against modern warships when it was all mostly copies of designs the Netherlands had used seventy or eighty years before. Even so, quantity mattered for some things, and the Rauhiranya’s forces were stronger than those of the Netherlands in the Pacific. But that was the last thing they wanted her to know.

"While the offer of such direct aid is well meant and will be communicated as well if it is your will, I do not believe it would have any effect on the decision of the Estates. Your original offer provides sufficient incentives, and I believe may allow our nation to clarify matters with the English so as to make them commit ahead of time in the event of war. It is merely that uncertainty that may stay our hands temporarily. Of course, conditions for a general war even now exist, and we do expect this present state of truce to be temporary," he offered helpfully.

Please convey that message to the Grand Pensionary and the Estates. We would appreciate it very much if you did so; the offer will remain standing within Our ability within the course of this war, and new ships are being laid down, anyway. When We take Manila, We will hold it temporarily and repeat the offer, with the prize in hand," Sita answered. "One wonders, however, where the great pride of the Dutch at sea is; Our fleet is built in imitation of the grand squadrons of De Ruyter that Our Great, Great Aunt once saw with her own eyes during her tour of Europe. Perhaps this is some issue relating to the death of the old Grand Pensionary," she concluded thoughtfully: "Nonetheless we do not fear the Spanish at all, but the French are a more serious matter."

The East India Company had gone to great lengths to hide the weakness of the Dutch Republic from the Kaetjhasti, and Fredericks was loath to give the game away himself. "There are a diversity of opinions and interests within the Republic," he willingly conceded, trying to draw the Empress away from her conclusions about Dutch naval strength.

"Some of them less favorable to war with France than others, and so our government moves with less swiftness than when a strong Stadholder is in power. But I will add my strong endorsement of your offer and can certainly assure you that the VOC has forbidden its merchants from supplying or trading with the French and Spanish in any way. We will exert pressure on the Moros of the region to do likewise. Once the situation in Europe has become clearer you may yet see our navy in action against our common rivals."

"So noted." Sita thought for a moment. "Tell us honestly--you say you are waiting for the English to act. The English, We know, are very good friends of the Portuguese, with whom We have long disputed the island of Timor and the surrounding archipelagos. Should We order the evacuation of Our garrison on Timor to remove this matter which might hinder the English in coming to Our aid, and let the Portugal reoccupy the islands? We do not mean to recognize their claims, but rather to simply abandon the possessions for the moment and allow the Portuguese to inevitably reoccupy them, so that they do not come between Us and the English in this critical time."

"The English and Portuguese have had an alliance ever since Portugal won its independence back from the Spanish, your Majesty. Nearly a century now, and the commerce of the Portuguese is almost entirely conducted by the English." There was a hint of irritation at that fact in his voice; only Spain and Portugal produced wines suitable for transport to tropical climates like Indonesia, and the English had a practical monopoly on both. And sensing parallels could be drawn, he exaggerated a bit.

"The relationship between those two countries is closer to that of a vassal with a lord. In that sense that Portuguese claims are necessarily upheld by the English as part of their duties to their clients." He put a stress on the last word, trying to convey the full shadings of subordination it suggested. "The evacuation of Timor under these circumstances would only improve the willingness of the English to take an open position on war with your enemies."

"It makes sense, from a military perspective, besides," Sita answered a bit round-about. "The garrison of Timor is the most familiar with fighting western armies, and We would prize their knowledge, and familiarity, in the regular army. So a fleet will be sent around Papua Minor to evacuate the garrison while avoiding the Franco-Spanish, so that it can reinforce the regular Army of Our state. Your Grand Pensionary may claim, if he wishes, that it was his idea and lobbying that brought this about, that the English may think the better of him and his concerns in this affair, since you are liable to have more influence with them than We."

"Your Majesty's suggestion in the matter is wise, and will certainly taken. The Dutch Republic will always stand ready to facilitate negotiations between your realm and the other European powers, should you later wish to pursue a formal settlement of the Timor matter." The barbarous oriental amazon was clever, certainly. Dealing with the minor sultans of the archipelago was always easier, even if they might have him beheaded in a fit of religious pique.

"Very good then. There is a final matter of some importance, then, which We wish to ask of you. Our army has followed the pattern laid down in Yasovati's time, and we have not engaged any western enemy extensively since the War over the Spanish Succession ended, and not even that saw more than the landing of some parties along various coasts at your behest. We should like you to gather all the men of the Dutch in the city who have military experience of a systematic and useful sort to accompany Us in reviewing units of Our troops of each type of unit, and make recommendations regarding the improvement of their armament that might be accomplished in the next few months, that will allow them to better face a European army of the scale We expect to fight.

"Recall that west of the Great Dividing Range, and south of the Isthmus you call the Isthmus of Torres, Our population is only perhaps three millions in all--it is a vast expanse of very lightly peopled terrain, compared with fourteen millions all told who reside on the plains of Kaetjh and the Tingfuéh peninsula. Those hold the real strength of Our State; so though the lands to the west are bountiful, and could produce spices to equal all of the Indies, We will let the French and the Spanish occupy them, for the moment. They will march many leagues to the East to get to grips with Our armies, or else try to organize the administration of that territory and introduce numerous settlers and slaves into it.

“In the former case We will be waiting for them at the best spot, when they are exhausted by their line of march, and have been forced to march many, many leagues. In the later case, We will take our time preparing the Army and Navy in overwhelming strength and excellence before counterattacking. But either way, there will be no negotiation, save to let their forces honourably leave Our territory when We have handed them many severe defeats, and if they have held the territory long enough to begin introducing slaves, We will sell them to you, of course."

She straightened a bit, and looked very intently to the Dutchman, and finished, rather softly: "But you do not need to concern yourself, nor should your government. We will fight. Oh, We will fight. But it will be at the time and place of Our choosing, and We will not accept the temptation to march Our army a great distance to engage them in open battle close to their ships and the cities they have taken."

"The Company maintains a register of traders in the city, and in your lands more generally. And of course we are familiar with our own staff. I shall personally see to the assembly of a troop of volunteers as you have in mind." Certainly there might be some former marines, or deserted mercenaries, or adventurers from God knew what countries, employed in the country trade with the Kaetjhasti and on hand for this purpose. In fact another idea did occur to him. "I will send a request to the directors on Batavia to make available some of our own commanders for your Majesty's service. We may also be able to find experts in the field of training soldiers from among the services of the Indian rajahs and potentates, and some of our merchant-captains may be willing to take on letters of marque from your Majesty's hand."

"All of these things would be notably appreciated. Let them, perhaps, meet Our fleet sent to evacuate Timor, so that they might quickly reach the Capitol. We intend to place the Red Banner Admiral Fernandez in command of this expedition, and you should confer with her about these arrangements; she will be given the authority to take these men into Our service, and to distribute letters of marque to your merchants, such of whom will take this offering. Let them range far and wide, and make Our name known to the French in distant lands."

It was, always, a bit uncomfortable to hear that name of the up-and-coming commander of the Upper Half of the Rear of the Kaetjhasti fleet, though other than her clearly Iberian features, Radna Fernandez was not much different than the other kshatra of the realm, unless one thought to ascribe to her a white man's intellect, which might be true. Such misfortunate wretches of women who had come to possess the strange malady of the Amazons, did at least seem to have children who rose fast and far in their system of government.

"As for the rest, inform Us when you have assembled the necessary men, and We will summon the intended review." Clever, indeed, almost unnaturally so, and with at least a superficial knowledge of European politics and history, she handled the situation with a patient confidence that would be unheard of in almost any other oriental ruler.

"I will send word to your Majesty as soon as they have been gathered." Which could be a day or two, depending on how sober they were, whether or not they had changed addressed, adding in some time to eliminate those who had shipped out. "Unless there are further matters to discuss I beg leave of your Majesty to depart, to see to the dispatch of letters and reports of this meeting and to arrange matters as requested."

"That is all We have to discuss with you. Your leave is granted," Sita answered simply.

[Simon_Jester]

Your Grace, do you think you could post a link to some of the factual background you've laid out on the Kaeties? I know it, but I imagine a number of the people who read this won't; it might help them make sense of what's going on. Especially since you've changed the geography from the base timeline...

[The Duchess of Zeon]

The World of the Kaetjhasti--A topographical map.

[Thanas]

I am not sure that your expedition against the spanish would have much success, if any. Depending on when this playes out, the Navy of Spain alone vastly outnumbers your force, nevermind the french.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

This is 1737. The size of the pacific squadrons, even though it was increased in response to the fact that the Dutch have spent the last 75 years or so paying the Kaetjhasti to raid their enemies for them (which is the exact cause of the expedition, as you may have gleaned by now), is still trivial compared to that of the French and Dutch navies. The thirty ships of war sent with this expedition is one of the largest and strongest western forces to ever enter the Pacific to date. Consider that even when fighting over India in the wars surrounding the American Revolution, Suffren commanded never more than fifteen ships of line. So the force standing off Lajhama has in strength of warships a commitment equal to that given to Suffren in the 1780s from the French, and then a comparable one from the Spanish. The expedition was conceived of to crush and seize a nation which had been essentially encouraged to epic heights of piratical indifference in the Pacific by the Dutch as an effort to compensate for their own weakness.

So while the obsolescent copies of the De Zeven Provincien, Eendracht and Brederode which the Kaetjhasti build and operate, and the armed Indiamen they send out in conjunction with them, would be badly, badly outmatched against a full modern Franco-Spanish fleet (though they do fire into the hull in the Dutch/English fashion), against the 50 - and 60- gun two deckers actually detailed to the pacific in small numbers, and the little corvettes and frigates supporting them, it's a rather different story. And to some extent the prospect of having to garrison their possessions more heavily was one of the driving keys to the Bourbon Spanish deciding to eliminate the noxious Amazons of the south rather than bother with the continued harassment of their raiding. The French went into it at the prospect for gaining a very considerable tract of land engaged in the cultivation of spice, which has long simply added to the Dutch dominance because the Dutch up through 1737 had secured exclusive trading rights with the Rauhiranya of the Kaetjhasti.

And of course the fleet of the Rauhiranya is quite large, though the ships are mostly used as troop transports, since her territory, far flung and comparatively lightly populated, is largely accessible from the sea.

I'll post a map with cities and roads in the area of contention next.

But yes, the chance of the expeditions succeeding is not really that great, and in fact in my timelime this will be the second time that the Kaetjhasti have attempted to besiege Manila, the first time being in relation with some events around Formosa and the Three Feudatories when they were trying to use their Dutch-designed ships to reestablish contact with China.

[Simon_Jester]

How overconfident are they in their own ships? I'm sensing some overconfidence, but I can't figure how much because I'm not an Age of Sail expert.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

In their own waters they have a decided advantage because they're based on very shallow-drafted Dutch designs and their waters are laden with coral reefs. Anywhere else, well, though they have a fair number of 80's, they don't even have the weight of shot of a French or Spanish 70 due to the much lighter guns being used on them.

[drakensis]

The weight of the guns is certainly going to be a significant issue. Number of guns was generally less decisive than the size of the guns in the main battery during this era.

Do the Kaetjhasti build their ships using teak? That would have advantages and disadvantages compared to the oak used in European ships - teak ships would be more resilient to shot IIRC, but splinter wounds would be far more likely to turn infectious.

[Thanas]

This is 1737.

Ah, okay. This means that you have picked one of the more stronger periods of Spanish decline. At this point their fleet should - iirc - consist of the Real Felipe (112), 2 80 gun ships and otherwise only 60 gun ships. The French would be a more dedicated enemy.

Of course, your small ships better hope not to ever go up against any of the larger French or Spanish ships.....

The size of the pacific squadrons, even though it was increased in response to the fact that the Dutch have spent the last 75 years or so paying the Kaetjhasti to raid their enemies for them (which is the exact cause of the expedition, as you may have gleaned by now), is still trivial compared to that of the French and Dutch navies. The thirty ships of war sent with this expedition is one of the largest and strongest western forces to ever enter the Pacific to date. Consider that even when fighting over India in the wars surrounding the American Revolution, Suffren commanded never more than fifteen ships of line. So the force standing off Lajhama has in strength of warships a commitment equal to that given to Suffren in the 1780s from the French, and then a comparable one from the Spanish. The expedition was conceived of to crush and seize a nation which had been essentially encouraged to epic heights of piratical indifference in the Pacific by the Dutch as an effort to compensate for their own weakness.

So while the obsolescent copies of the De Zeven Provincien, Eendracht and Brederode which the Kaetjhasti build and operate, and the armed Indiamen they send out in conjunction with them, would be badly, badly outmatched against a full modern Franco-Spanish fleet (though they do fire into the hull in the Dutch/English fashion), against the 50 - and 60- gun two deckers actually detailed to the pacific in small numbers, and the little corvettes and frigates supporting them, it's a rather different story.

I doubt that one. A Spanish-built 60 gun ship of that time - which actually was an otherwise excellent design despite the obvious small size issues - should easily outmaneuver and outshot any of them. De Zeven Provincien has a good main battery, but you are asking it to go up against ships that have 50 years of designs between them. So they might hold their own, but the Kaetjhasti are much better off copying contemporary designs. Nevermind the absolute disaster that would happen if the French sent a fource of three or four heavy ships of the line to reinforce the Spanish squadrons, same for what happens when the Spanish sent the Armada based off Cadiz.

But I'll stop nitpicking now, this is a story after all.

[Simon_Jester]

I think the more fundamental issue here is that Spain and France's governments were probably expecting an operation with difficulty on the order of suppressing one or two of the Barbary corsair states, not a long-distance war against a country capable of building a (relatively) large number of ships with heavy frigate or light man-of-war* level firepower.

Sure, they'd be in trouble against a French heavy or one of the few Spanish heavies, but the odds of many of those heavies being committed to the theater are relatively low.

*woman-of-war? With the Kaetjhasti, there is never any reason to call the ships anything but "she..."

[The Duchess of Zeon]

It is actually a fairly heavy squadron off Lajhama. Anyway, it depends on a lot of factors; the Kaeties go to sea a hell of a lot more often since they use their navy for transport for the government all the time. Their sailing rigs aren't as good on many ships, being older and less efficient, but they're being fairly rapidly re-rigged as they come in, precisely because their piratical activities lets them get ahold of vessels with new techniques and designs for them to copy. This is especially true for the privateers who need to catch their prey, and put some of their own money into it. The problem is it's a relatively mixed bag; the fleet is large but not up to date in part because the Kaetjhasti aren't in the European climate of predatory naval competition and warfare. Also, the heavier designs of the French and Spanish do have real disadvantages on the tangle of coral reefs off the lands of the Rauhiranya. The older Dutch designs are still used heavily in part simply because they're very well suited for shallow draft operations, and skipping their way delicately through the coral reefs where the pilots intimately know every passage through long experience.

The government for that matter is a rather mixed bag, a pastiche of European and oriental elements as interpreted through the eyes of someone who more or less recreated large organized states for them after the Kaetjhasti Dark Ages, as they're usually called in popcult of the modern era, but the term is as usual a horrifyingly inaccurate one. It is however a very well run state, by any standard, with extensive bureaucratic record-keeping and a sort of civil service. But I prefer more to tell through the story than not...

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Chapter Three.


“She’s a Demi-Batterie ship of war, aunt! I’m sure of it!” The demure face of Chilan’s was a strange contrast with the dazzling array of silk scarves banded around layed silk—to help prevent the infection of wounds—white tunics, and spun up to cover her hair from the sun as she looked intently through the European-made spyglass on the port quarter of the Ruby-Hawk, as her name would translate from Bausa Kaetjha.

“Skulking around Dhamyuk Isle? Gods above but I thought the Navy had better Captains than that. And Demi-Batterie, you can see her oars out to be sure?” The ship’s Captain was of Chinese heritage, and her niece more her adopted daughter, from a far-flung land. Ngui Zhen had been a sailor and privateer for the past thirty years, and wasn’t precisely the most trusting of people, even for the girl that she’d raised as her own for the past ten. In memory of her dead eldest daughter, carried off to her next life by cannon-shot from a Annam customs junk.

Per the old traditions of her people, Zhen had taken a small boat a few days later at about the same spot, just down the coast, and kidnapped a girl from one of the coastal fishing villages. As it had always been, when your children died at the hands of an enemy, you took one of their children to replace your loss, though on her adulthood Chilan would start her own motherline, for the right of the theft ended there. And she’d be a devilish fine privateer at that, a natural hand for the mathematics of navigation and steady in battle, though she retained a standoffish nature amongst her peers that Zhen blamed mostly on her own imposing presence aboard the Ruby-Hawk.

“No, no oars out, but some of her ports seem very low to the water… And she’s not a Navy ship,” Chilan answered after a moment. “Isn’t flying the Ray-on-pinion, as best I can tell. And no blue band on the upper decks. Rig’s very fine, too, and don’t you always say the Navy’s filled with sluggards about adopting better rig, Aunt?” She addressed her elder with a polite fidelity which had become natural, in the years so long as to divorce her near entirely from the memory of her old family, so that the petite but hardened pirate Ngui Zhen was for all intents and purposes her mother. The term of address was more one of endearment, for mother was a term loaded with symbolism, than anything else, and it still thrilled the girl’s heart to see Zhen, so healthy at her age and standing confident in her robes and pantaloons upon the deck, and her long, gray-flecked dark hair tightly braided down her back, with shards of metal carefully woven through it by her servants to provide an unpleasant surprise to someone who might grab it in a boarding action.

And she was as wise and swift in her thoughts as ever, too, the woman who had taught her a practical working knowledge of the geometry and the cycles of the sun and moon and stars while hunched over the chart-table of a swaying ship. “They are, they damned well are…” Sighing very faintly the older woman, hair flecked with gray, moved to her daughter and snatched the spyglass from her, with a gesture as swift as it was gentle. Her eyes were not as good—and she was loathe to risk the thing up on the main-top for the good European kind cost a small fortune even for a rich and successful privateer—and she mostly just wanted a look for herself. It was, indeed, a very good rig, and she hadn’t seen the markings on the hull with its distinctive two rows of gun decks ever before.

“A ship of war, to be sure, and if she’s not a Demi-batterie she mounts at least as many and probably more guns than we do. And not from the Navy... Not a Dutchman, either, I think. Like you said, no blue band and we share it, my girl.”

“It’s such a shame,” Chilan sighed, “That she’s to leeward. Can’t really see her flags standing out at this angle.”

“Oh, I think we’ll see them soon enough. She’s taking toward us, look at her starting to heel my girl.” A pause, and she added with a thoughtful paranoia. “And I don’t think it’s a bad thing she’s to lee. Means we have the weather gage.” And you should know how important that is by now! She didn’t snap, for she trusted Chilan to know just that.

“Why would you…” The girl frowned darkly. “You think we’ll be in a fight? This close to Lajhama on our own coast, Aunt!?”

“Yes, I do. Yes I do,” Zhen lowered the spyglass that she’d still be staring through, as she had watched the hull of the distant vessel roll and heel sharply as she tacked to windward. Toward them, on as close an intercept course as the wind would allow. Against the Ruby-Hawk, of the latest Dutch pattern of Indiaman with 42 guns. And Zhen knew that whomever over there was electing that course knew that they were facing a ship with two pierced decks as well. Confident.

Zhen watched silently as they drew closer, and the minutes passed, and at last the unknown ship began to swing and heel over on her port tack. And it was then that she sucked in her breath, for it delivered to even her eyes through the spyglass a clear view of the flags she was flying, and Zhen had never thought to see that flag so close to friendly shores. Indeed, considering who she was, she disliked seeing that flag at all. And worse…

Black hull. Blue fighting tops. The banded, gaudy colours faintly visible marking the stern works, more organized, less chaotic than the glorious idolatry of her own ship. But still grand and riotous. No, it all came together perfectly, and there was only one answer. An answer that was impossible, unbelievable, ridiculous. But then, why was it any of those? They had been raiding for years, every time the Dutch were at war—why shouldn’t the favour be returned? Or worse. No time for worrying about that, though.

“Sound quarters and stand by to wear ship!!” She handed the eyeglass to Chilan and turned back toward the wheel where already one of her attendants was blowing hard on a conch-shell horn, which was only used to signal battle, and immediately followed by the drum-girls, all three of them bringing their sticks down to collide with the great Chinese drum fixed aft on the main deck and thundering through the entire hull. Nobody questioned her, though Chilan looked on with surprise until Zhen explained herself.

“She’s flying the Spanish flag, my girl,” the woman said simply, and grimly, but the conclusion was grimmer still if it were possible. “With signal flags run up. We wear ship and we sail close-hauled for the Samootha reef. Should be able to stay close enough in to the wind to make it and then we’ll try for the Ilak channel in the south. They’ll deserve to kill us if they are mad enough to follow us through and lucky enough to make it work. There’s a squadron out there, and they’re coming after us—gods above and below if I would know why, but they are. If we didn’t hold the weather gage we’d already be buried, and just not dead yet.”

Her adoptive daughter thought through that for only the briefest of moments. “We’re at war, then?” The thoughts of a war, a real maritime war… But where would they bring ships from, to match the fleets of the Rauhiranya at Kaenura? Have they come all the way from Europe? Her mother’s words brought no comfort in them.

“Most likely. Which means you should see to your duties, Chilan. They may yet get close enough to fire shots after us, and not even for us will Samootha be a pleasant run.” Her weathered face, atop a wiry if short body, stared off to where the Spaniard could be seen with the naked eye, if only indistinctly to her. A part of her rawly wished that Chilan wasn’t aboard, that it wouldn’t happen again, but it was too late for that and the girl’s lot had been to replace the labour of her lost Fei. But in the process she’d grown as dear to the heart as her birth-daughters, and…

No time for sentiment. Zhen had been planning on retiring for some time now, each voyage was to be the last, but it appeared even that little voice would be silenced for quite some time now. She’d just have to get through Samootha, and then they’d be clear to sail and plot and fight and see what good they’d be for the Rauhiranya when she’d sorely need it. She turned her attention back to where she was needed, and everything was banished but actions and deeds.

“Wear the ship! Ready full starboard rudder…!” They’d swing hard to port, pass through the wind, and then, well, a boon from the Vighneshvara would certainly be appreciated. And the world would never quite be the same again for these women of the sea, who had in the days since Tasman’s anchors had bit the mud of Kaenura harbour known the Pacific as the playground of their devilish skill with Dutch ships and Dutch cannon.



******************************************



The distant thunder of cannon echoing across the Van Diemen Gulf, as it was called on the Dutch charts, firing salutes or perhaps in chace, had caused great excitement at the camp of the Franco-Spanish Army in the morning, for all knew it was a battle being fought at sea. But they had been assured that the cannon fire was perhaps a dozen leagues distant or more, the natural clear air of the tropics and lack of other sounds providing for its continuation across an enormous distance.

This reassurance having been given to the men, there had been no need to do more than post a double-watch in the port, with the better part of the ships of the line sent with the expedition in the harbour and mounting double-watches themselves to guard against the approach of any Amazon vessel toward the transports at Lajhama Port. In light of that, the majority of the officers including Captain de Lapniac had secured their usual leave, and he had used it to meet again with the Brahmin Aditi, as he had promised and they had arranged, leaving his valet behind entirely on this excursion.

He made his way to the correct Wat—or so he suspected, but it proved his memory had indeed not betrayed him—and followed the route through its grand ruinous structure until the areas of restoration, slightly advanced from even the day before, was again marked. The path to the pool in this case was covered in a few short minutes, and there, waiting, with the other Amazons not in evidence, was Aditi, sitting beside it with a scarf pulled over her head to ward off the intensity of the sun approaching noon.

“Blessings to you, Captain,” she offered as she looked to him with clever and thoughtful eyes, noting his careful and formal presentation compared to her own relaxed garb of robes and tunics, though the sword-belt for the keris she was still allowed to bear still left no doubt of her ultimate profession and status. “Your people have found a fight at sea?”

“Perhaps one of the distant squadrons, yes,” de Lapniac answered, but he moved rather quickly beyond the subject. “We do not know, of course, and won’t, perhaps for a day or more. Did you have a restful evening?”

“Yes, thank you.” There was a faintly amused look that crossed her face for a moment, perhaps some private joke. “It’s very peaceful in these ruins, and I don’t mind them, as homes go. Grander in decay than the temples my family maintains, even. And I have water for you if you need it, though of course I cannot offer to dine with you over the sake of taint.”

“I understand, and thank you, the water will doubtless be appreciated in the heat.”

“So, since we are all well… What shall we talk about today?” The Brahmin woman looked on with curiousity at the prospect of what the foreign officer and lord would request of her now, and wondered to herself, if the boon of aiding his interesting quest for knowledge would in any way perhaps one day restore her safe to her family.

“Since we had begun on the subject of your peoples history and religion, I should like to continue to learn there. You did, as I recall, say with certainty that your people were once among the builders of the abandoned cities in this western region?"

"Yes, with certainty, the records of the past tell us that much," Aditi replied. "These cities were built... Six or seven centuries before the curse of Kali fell upon us, five or six centuries before the Great Armada arrived. I cannot tell you how long ago that was, though, for records were not well kept for many generations after the curse of Kali fell, so we cannot say how long passed between the end of the old records and the beginning of our current ones, which use your western calendar besides. I understand they were however abandoned due to the endless depredations of Moro raiders, and the population moved east rather than subject to those who would kill them on account of their religion."

"This Great Armada you speak of, from where did it come?" As far as de Lapniac knew, none of the seafaring Muslim powers of the region had ever been powerful enough to be impressive and such an Armada would not have been recalled except with terror and revulsion. And hadn’t he heard such a thing mentioned in connection with the obviously Chinese descended Amazons?

"From Sina, the land of the Great Emperors which lays to the North and West from here. They settled many, many colonists on the northwestern peninsula of Arjuna's land which has since been named for them Tingfuéh. They came in splendid ships, the size of the largest which you have sailed into this port, or indeed larger, of the sort that we still use to transport cargo in the inner cities, with rafted masts, of the same sort the people of Sina use today, but much larger, with nine masts, and the whole fleet in total, of these greater ships and the lesser ones beside, numbered more than two hundred ships.

“They made the local Rajahs render up tribute to the Great Emperor, and in turn lavished them with impossible gifts, and gave them gunpowder and cannon and rockets, and the designs to their great ships, for the act of doing Tribute, and as the price of reserving such a great land for the settlement of those from Sina. Some people from Sina had, I understand, reached our lands before this, and introduced the idea of the wise Buddha as a sage of religion to our people, and his interpretations on faith are still followed today by those descended from the people of Sina, though the rest of us do respect them as part of the great teachings. The commander of the Armada was a very powerful man from the court of the Great Emperor, a castrated man as they are wont to do with those men of power, that they won't seize the throne for themselves, and his name was Zheng He."

"So this is how the Chinese women came to be included among your populations before the great curse?" The diverse nature of the Amazons was a puzzling matter, once the nature of their reproduction had become apparent.

"Yes. They are because of this one of the four great races cursed by Kali; there are five lesser races also cursed by Kali."

"Ah." He thought they might be getting somewhere interesting now. Visions of an invitation to salons or even an award to the Academie dangled before him. "There were some rather unknown races among your enlisted... soldiers." He stumbled over the tendency to use the masculine. "The large women who have skin as dark as Africans, and with woolly hair. And the other large ones, of a different shade and much more formidable stature than yourself. How did these races come to be cursed as well?"

"Because they were ruled by the same Rajas as the men who violated the sacred herds of Kali, or else comprised by their race, members of the crew," Aditi replied. "The wooly-haired ones are the Papua, whom we divide between the Papua of the north and of the south. In the north, they live in villages built in giant trees in the mountains of the lesser of the two lands of the Nagas, and on the greater, here where were stand, Bharat Nagasti, they live in the deserts and hill-lands, and are nomads who travel their villages from place to place.

“There are some differences between the two, they have wider noses in Bharat Nagasti and often taller and leaner. They inhabited these lands before us, but since they only used stone and were not as cunning as our ancestors, our ancestors easily smashed them. But then we took them, and showed them the appropriate rituals for honouring the High Gods, where before they had only honoured the local spirits of the land, who we also honour, as is custom. So while they are stronger than us they have never been capable enough to defeat us, and their numbers are but small, but they're prized as rank and file in war since they do fight very hard, and even a few of their best families are accounted equal with our higher castes, but these ones are very rare,” Aditi answered thoughtfully.

"Those are two of the lesser races," she added. "The other race of which you speak, is our equal in most rights, and has long proved a great and worthy foe in Arjunasti, where they fight very vigorously and learned from the first moment to build hilltop fortresses which can resist cannon fire, and every single village has one of these, making the conquest of even five hundreds of people living in a few great houses to be difficult enough to require a battery of artillery and a battalion of troops.

“They are called the Maori and are very fierce fighters, and their numbers in the Rauhiranya's land are slightly greater than those of the Chinese. They invaded Arjunasti from the east, from the islands of the great South Sea, and perhaps they came from the Americas originally; we do not know. But these lands they had begun to invade, around the time we first reached them, and since overran all of the native inhabitants, who call themselves the La-pi-ta, and who are the fourth of the great races. Their chieftanesses have become part of the kshatra, and their seers and doctors brahmin, in both counts, on account of their integration into the Empire by Yasovati, the First Empress who is the Sun."

"They, like the Papua, did not know the working of iron when they were first found, but very quickly adopted it, in the days before the plague, and use the axe and spear with great felicity."

"The Lapita, I should add, are like them, but darker skinned and generally shorter of stature, and speak a very different tongue, but they are not nearly so dark and loathesome, as the Dutch would say, as the Papua are, and still may be fine to the eye. The Lapita were the original inhabitants of Arjunasti, save those regions inhabited by the Chomoi, and the Papua, the original inhabitants of Nagasti, both lesser and greater."

"So of the races of your empire, there are the oriental populations such as yourself who descend from the settlers of this city and the others. The Chinese, settled by this Great Armada. The Maori, from this land across the sea, where the Lapita also dwell. And the negro people you account minor races, in two variations. What constitute the other minor races? Are there examples of all such peoples living in this city or among your soldiers?"

"No, just Chinese and those of our race--the Malays--here. The Papua dwell to the east and south of here, and to the north across the narrow sea, of which we stand at the neck, and in those places live beside Malay colonists and Chinese of the merchant caste," Aditi replied, thoughtfully. "Of the other minor races, there is one sort of like the Lapita, except with woolly hair, who live along the eastern coast of the great Isthmus connecting greater and lesser Nagasti; they settled there by boats many centuries ago, and as I mentioed the Chomoi, who are exceedingly tall and have deeply white skin, as alabaster, though with dark hair.

“They live in the western highlands of southern Arjunasti, and speak a language not related to any other that we know, but they have always been there and are the foes of all around them. They are cursed as we are cursed and have no men, which is why I count them, but they have not been brought under the authority of the Empress who is the Sun despite several expeditions having been sent against them. The last of the five minor races live in the eastern highlands of Arjunasti, and are like the Maori in all respects except their tongue is different, though related, and they are more lithe; they, too, have not yet been subdued by the Empress who is the Sun.

“But you will find many Papuans and some of the people of the Isthmus in the army, and the later also in the navy. Among the soldiers paroled there are both Maori and Lapita, and perhaps some of a mixing of the two--for there are many motherlines descended from people mixed between the two, and sometimes also part-Malay, and part-Maori or Lapita, and of course many part Malay, and part Chinese, because the people married amongst each other, before the Curse fell upon them and no more changes in the nature of Motherlines have taken place since, since each one is distinct."

The Frenchman paused for a moment to process that, and to freeze the brief overview of the races of the Amazons in memory. They seemed rather widespread geographically, and it strained credibility to imagine that such a diverse assortment of peoples had all been present on a boat, or represented in the cities of this area. "You say they are all cursed because of the actions of a boat, or by virtue of having been subject to the rajahs of the sailors who ate of Kali's cattle. Yet we have heard of Malay peoples in the interior who are not cursed, and of course the great mass of Chinese are like Moors and Europeans. Surely these far-flung minor races as well were not all under the authority of the rajahs of the coast, either?"

Indeed the description of the Chomoi and the Maori suggested strongly that they were not. So the curse did not seem to be racial, but neither could it correspond with some ancient Malay polity that had incorporated all of the cursed races, could it?

"Ah, but consider a map of the land of Arjunasti. It parallels closely, sometimes by a distance of only a few leagues at the Straits of Samadare, the land of Nagasti Bharat, so that the great ships given to us by Sina traveled along every part of the coast, and the Chomoi have access to the sea, and their villages by the sea are famed as whalers in the southern ocean, where the cursed isles lie. I do not know about the extent of the places of the Rajas of the past, but I know that the southern of the two inner seas, on which the cursed isles lie, has Maori, and Lapita, and Chomoi, and Papua, and Malays, all along the coast, and Chinese are regular in the crews of ships.

“So this is how we understood things to come about. That said, we know that if women of foreign shores live among us for long enough that they acquire our traits. We call them people of the seas and since they do not yet have their own motherlines we foster them among the kshatra, for they're gifts of the God of the Sea. I know for a fact that the Banner Admiral of the Red holds the mother-lineage name of Fernandez, and descends from some shipwreck of Spain or Portugal, and there are others among us, also from the lands of Indochine, and Japan, who came to us by various means, and some women of the Dutch also, who then stopped the practice of allowing women to accompany their men amongst us."

"Now, as for why, it is true, there are Malays here who are not cursed, these regions had fallen under the tyrannical tribute of the Moros at the time, and thus they were not included into the curse, and still reside and practice the Hindoo ways in the highlands." A pause, and she stretched and added quietly: "But there are none further east."

De Lapniac nodded, though intended to consult the maps and geography of the eastern portions of the Amazon realm when he could. And the fact that women who lived among the Amazons acquired their signature characteristic was interesting. There was also the hard-earned experience of the Dutch that the Amazons could have an effect on men as well, the short sickness and loss of fertility that happened rarely but notably enough. But it was certainly evident why they believed so strongly in the curse of a goddess, for it explained their uniqueness and the contours of its effects.

"Are there any other symptoms of this curse, except for the difficulty of your reproduction?" If there were, it might be telling.

"A fever strikes for two or three weeks, amongst those women have fallen upon it from outside our realms, as well as various pains of the body and some swelling, though they almost inevitably recover while other such fevers may kill," Aditi answered, largely recounting identical symptoms to those the Dutch men driven sterile were reported to have suffered beforehand, curiously.

"They sometimes must live among us for years, or even a decade, before this happens, and often only occurs when they grow sick with some other condition beforehand. Other than the great number of miscarriages and the fact that our children are always female and always resemble their mothers, without deviation, in physical appearance, and their sisters and other siblings besides, there are no other differences."

"Indeed, such are the similarities between us and your races," Aditi continued, shamelessly and innocent of the impact it might have, "that sexual congress, while necessary for reproduction in your race, is not for us, it nonetheless makes it more likely that a woman will be with child, when she partakes of the sexual act, though she never once will have a child with features of her partner, but only with the features of herself as I described, even then. But the mere imitation of the regular act in the other races of humanity surely does make the likelihood of the growth of a child in her womb greater, for all that nothing else changes."

The frankness of such talk from a woman, and even more so the sheer objectivity, was momentarily shocking. Enough for de Lapniac to avert his eyes temporarily, but he gave no other signs of the struggle to maintain his composure. He remembered where he was, and who he was talking with, after a moment of lapse, and returned to acknowledge his understanding.

"So you pursue such congress as a part of your reproduction?" Which raised another question. "And how are such... mates chosen? Among most peoples, one's parents arrange for marriages to produce children."

"Well, it is absolutely and utterly forbidden, the highest form of prohibited and unclean, for the congress of two women of the same mother-lineage to take place; an utterly abhorent act," Aditi began rather sternly. "But in the higher castes it is commonplace for women of the same status to sleep with each other as a matter of course. This is without restraint when younger, but it is very proper when one is older to find a partner, with whom one will remain faithful, save in the rearing of younger women in the ways of life, which is considered a separate sort of relationship.

“As for the peasantry they usually form relationships from younger ages, and frequently these relationships are between members of the same mother-lineages, over and over again. For example when two women are together in this fashion, the daughter of one may end up together with the daughter of the cousin of the other, and vice-versa, so that the families will be strongly intertwined. And several families will be intertwined in this way and support each other through the obligations of these relationships, as will also be the case in the high caste when, on abouts the thirtieth year of life, they settle down with partners they desire.”

The morals of the Amazons were, as expected, utterly alien and devoid of the illumination of Christian sentiment. This was not uncommon in the East, and de Lapniac thought momentarily of his own hypocrisy in that respect but quickly disregarded it. "That is a very different manner of doing things," he said finally, just stating the obvious as a means of organizing his thoughts.

"It is the manner we have adopted, to live as we are," Aditi answered simply. "So our ancestresses did during the Great Fall which followed the curse, and so we continue--for they knew how to meet their new circumstances, in ways which worked, and work now for us, and shall always work for us. And so thus we do as they did. Yes, it's very true that it is very different from the customs of your people as I know from the Father Pietro, but so are we a very different people, and each people of the Earth, coming into existence separately, has their own customs as determined by Gods and Circumstance alike. I see nothing strange in that fact."

"No other people that we know of deals with your curse or even remotely similar circumstances," de Lapniac conceded. They were just too weird to hold by European standards. "You do not suffer from the disadvantages of such loose conduct the way men and women in other societies do, save perhaps the threat to your souls, but I am no priest. Are there other restrictions or prohibitions commonly applied to your family structures and choice of lovers?"

"Well, the custom is moral by the commands of our gods," Aditi replied. "For all I have heard it condemned before, by priests of your Christian faith. But I am not a Christian, and my mother is the head of a great temple of Lakshmi in the capitol. As for these other prohibitions, they do exist; it is unclean and forbidden and seriously punished for a woman greater than the age of fifteen, to have concourse with a girl younger than the age of twelve, though a more minor offense for girls of twelve to fifteen to do so, since they are but ignorant and curious.

“When a child is taken into a motherline, for instance when that motherline has lost a member of its family to the people of the village of the child, so they take the child and raise her as one of their own to replace the member their village killed, she becomes a part of their caste--and that is the only way to change castes which is permissable--but also her own motherline is afterwards forever off-limits in a sexual sense to the motherline that fostered her in. This is also true of the foundlings of the sea and so on; for example the family that adopted the foundress of the motherline of the Fernandez, whomever they mave have been, is off-limits to the descendants of the Fernandez motherline, for-ever, and so on like this.

“Sudra, peasants, may never sleep with the higher castes under any circumstance. Vaishya, merchants, and Kshatra, warriors and nobility, may sleep with each other freely, but the Brahmin of my caste may never sleep with anyone of another caste, lest we incur ritual impurity, nor may we ever sleep with someone who has not yet been cursed, even if they are of the Brahmin caste, for this is also ritual impurity in our special service to Kali. Though it is not prohibited from the lesser castes the special purity of the Brahmin demands also they abstain from sexual relations as the cycles of the moon call their blood, and when they are with child. These are the other laws governing our sexual conduct.

"As for the structures of the family, the eldest woman, when she is of sound mind, always rules the motherline, with the sole exception of the motherline of the Empress who is the Sun, where the headship of the family is held with the Empress who is the Sun--the Rauhiranya--and the title is passed from eldest daughter to eldest daughter, and so on. A few of the highest nobility have a similar exception, but there are a few other specific exceptions to what we call the taboo after the naming for it by the Maori, the sacred-forbidden, which are gifted to the family of the sacred Rauhiranya, for they are imbued with the divine essence of the great Sun God Surya and his wives and mistresses, and have in them a certain presence of male essence and qualities due to this.”

"Perhaps then you can tell me more of the nature of your Empress?" Had it been implied that she was divine? But embued with the essence of a god, not goddess. In any case, the royal family seemed to be at the head of intersections of the social, religious, and political order of the Amazons.

"She is the mortal incarnation of the female aspect of the God Surya, for of course all things have male and female aspects; so as the radiant sun in the sky shines with the masculine power of Surya, she is eminent on the Earth with His feminine power. The Imperial line was founded by the great Yasovati, in the year sixteen and twenty-three of your Christ, when her fate was revealed to her by the dream-questing of her family at the ruined temple of Surya in Kaenura, and there she undertook to organize a guard for the ruins of the temple, and to fight with the impious kshatra of the region, until she overtook them, and over the next score of years, came to rule all of the great plain of Kaetjh, reuniting the torn and shattered remnants of society that remained after the Great Fall, and then overtook the Tingfuéh peninsula as well.

“Her skin is tinted blue as a sign of her contact with the divine, a process that comes about through the regular bathing in the sacred waters of the springs of the temple, and the drinking thereof, which imbue the Rahiranya and her heirs with this colour, showing off this sign of her being touched by the divine. She is not a goddess on this Earth, but Surya elevates her into a lesser deity, a Deva-astra, upon her death, and so she skips the dharmic cycle which constraints all others, and serves in the halls of Surya as a Deva-astra, and is worshipped at her tomb, in her own right; but no worship is accorded her while her mortal body resides on this Earth, for divinity only comes to her soul when it is returned to the essence of Surya upon her death."

Her religious stature sounded like one of those hair-splitting definitions of the nature of the Trinity, enough to dissuade de Lapniac from investigating that angle much further. It would suffice to say that the Empress had some essence of Surya, as a kind of mirror-image. "The duality you mention is interesting," he commented offhandedly. "Without men around, the most obvious masculine force is absent in your society. Do you believe women who perform the roles of men, such as fighting, have some greater presence of this masculine force, contrasted with the normal feminine?"

"The kshatra follow the precepts of the warriors of the Mahabharat, and we Brahmin, as priests of the Divine Gods, are also imbued with certain of these precepts. It is a fact, that the lowest castes most resemble the womanly behaviour of other races, and those of the highest castes, resemble it the least... So the rank and file who fight, behave as women, but women are ferocious in the defense of their families, as the female animal is over her own offspring, yet that ferocity is normally uncoordinated, and it is the more masculine traits of the kshatra, which are based on the Mahabharat and the Ramayana, which allow its organization and capture into the spirit of a regular army.

“And so it is, that in our society, the women of the upper classes must be responsible, whereas in other societies, they are allowed to be frivolous, because they have no duties, and all people rise to the nature of their responsibilities, with their seriousness and commitment; the wives of the chiefs of the Moros, are frivolous and worthless because they are locked inside, and for all their high breeding, have no responsibility. But consider how the poor woman in the field, even in Timor and other such lands, will work hard to preserve her offspring, and suffer much, even when her husband is a drunken lout. So it is that in foreign societies I have seen, being powerful brings out the best in men, and the worst in women, and being poor, brings out the worst in men, and best in women; but in our society both being rich and poor, brings out the best in women, because women here are responsible for everything. In this fashion do we Brahmin and the Kshatra carry on the ruling of society, and it is certainly true that those of our castes have the most masculine traits.

"But most importantly, we have those traits because we love our families and our offspring dearly, and wish for our offspring, to live the same lives that we have, and we will fight very hard to preserve for them that future. We desire for things to be, as they have always been; and I think the masculine traits are only in those of the higher rank, those who have of late conceived of our society improving over what it once was, rather than merely preserving it."

Now that was an interesting perspective, and she raised quite a few points that had not occurred to de Lapniac. Certainly such sentiments would find favor in more progressive circles and certainly with women of an intellectual bent, of the sort he needed to impress at Court. But now, he should turn his attention for the rest of the day to a real effort at learning the language…

[Simon_Jester]

A few random notes:

And she’d be a devilish fine privateer at that, a natural hand for the mathematics of navigation and steady in battle...

I love a girl who can handle a cosine.

her long, gray-flecked dark hair tightly braided down her back, with shards of metal carefully woven through it by her servants to provide an unpleasant surprise to someone who might grab it in a boarding action.

Did anyone ever actually do that?

This reassurance having been given to the men, there had been no need to do more than post a double-watch in the port, with the better part of the ships of the line sent with the expedition in the harbour and mounting double-watches themselves to guard against the approach of any Amazon vessel toward the transports at Lajhama Port.

Is Lajhama on the site of any real-world city? I forget, and your map doesn't have any locations marked.

Her religious stature sounded like one of those hair-splitting definitions of the nature of the Trinity, enough to dissuade de Lapniac from investigating that angle much further.

Smart man. Gives me a splitting headache, too.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Sorry, I can't currently locate my map with locations marked. A hint, though--Lajhama is on the gulf of Van Diemen, so....

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Alright, found it!

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Chapter Four


“There are so many of them as this, mommy?” Chilan turned back in exasperated desperation as Ngui Zhen laughed softly and shook her head… And engulfed the girl in a brief, taut hug, who had just returned from the maintop with the latest sighting, Zhen no longer caring about the risk to fine and expensive optics if issuing them out to her lookouts on high might save her ship from being caught unawares.

“It makes sense, I’m afraid, my dear. Just because we got to the reef before their chasers tore our rigging to shreds didn’t mean the sound of the guns wouldn’t attract them, and of course they’re reducing the coastal cities.”

“I didn’t realize the war would be so big,” the girl admitted softly. “It’s just a single two decker and a small single deck ship, though. We might have a chance. Especially if they were taking some troopers down the coast… They may be guarding a convoy.” She glanced up to where the repairs to the rigging from the few chaser shots that had passed through were still being made. “Same orders though either way, right?”

“Damn straight, my lass! We run with the wind, all safe sail. We never opened our ports so if we’re truly blessed they’ll think we’re a fat freighter ourselves and that little one will use her speed to come into touch and give us a chance, a small one, to defeat them in turn, though they will be expecting us to be well-armed regardless. Or if you’re right they’ll turn back to their fat wallowing sows in their wake and that’ll be it. Order’s order in the European navies and they won’t forget their charges to chase prizes, Mother Durga bless ‘em for it now, as it’s a considerably better way of surviving.”

“Two points starboard rudder!” Chilan snapped confidently. “All safe sail!”

“Now,” Zhen spared a last look through her spyglass and then turned to the Maori woman, Kowhai Ul’tikit, who was her master-at-arms. “Same as before, my friend. Double crews on the stern chasers and hold all the ports closed. They’re the ones who hold the weather gauge this time, though … Hmm.”

“Chilan, three and a half glasses ‘till sunset?”

“That’s right,” she answered, now a bit sheepish at the youthful term of endearment.

“Maybe we are as home free as I thought we’d be when we cleared the reef after all. But we won’t continue north. No, no, they won’t get within cannon-shot of us before nightfall, and we’ll perhaps slip away in the night, west, where they won’t really be expecting us to run, not for the shelter of the northern ports—for it’s dubious enough!—or into the bay. No, we’ll come about tonight and make for Timor.”

“They might have already invaded Timor… But we can keep going all the way to Batavia if we have to.”

“Exactly. To Batavia, if we must, and then back home. But I think it easier to sail north ‘round Papua in any case. And tonight will tell us a great many things regardless—whether or not they were convoying, and if they both will maintain a close pursuit. The squadron will be back to its duties and we’ve got enough sea room we might yet make sport of it all.”

“Chitrala?” She addressed her mate coming up from below at having roused the sleeping crew from their bunks to perform the evolution. “I’m going to want the night-watch this eve. Hold the ship steady and rouse me at once if the enemy tries for ranging fire, but we’ll be manoeuvring tonight and I aim to stay fresh for it. And let the crew nap when we’ve settled in on our course. I’ll want the guns crewed tonight and the Ruby-Hawk cleared for action, so that come to it we might get some advantage out of a night fight. They certainly won’t be expecting us to show discipline... And pray to Ganesh that our wake doesn’t glow.”

“Aye Captain.” She took her own spyglass and stared after the sails closing on the horizon, which could have been marked to their decks by their paint from the maintop but nowhere else. “Just two? We might take them…”

“I suspect we could take the single decker, if the damage we’d suffer wouldn’t leave us open to being overhauled,” Zhen replied. “If that’s just a fourty, the other ship, or an militarized Indiaman, their navies do that often enough too, I might give us some chance against both… If they were Chinese. Or Japanese, or some Sultan’s little band of warriors. But with good ships, good men. The Great Empress Herself learned the art of shipbuilding from the Dutch, and if they’re better than these French and Spanish, well, if I had a sixty-four, I’d make to fight. I don’t.” She snapped her own glass shut. “Didn’t seem profitable, even though I’ve got the money for one. Suspect with a war like this on I’ll pay to have one outfitted and seek her captaincy for the Navy.”

“Our crew, to go to the Navy?” Chitrala tossed a startled look her Captain’s way.

“If we don’t show ‘em we can stand up to ‘em on their terms, they’ll just keep pushing. You’re either Zheng Chenggong or you’re dead, and I don’t recall making my passage to the sea so I could die. You’ve got the watch, Chitrala.”

“Captain.” She nodded silently and turned to check the compass heading, as Zhen motioned to her adoptive daughter and in silent understanding they went below.

Pulling off her clothes, Zhen tossed her hair back into the net that tended to guard herself from injury when she did not care to unbind the complex interwoven bits of metal within it, and gratefully accepted a cup of a tincture to help her sleep as Chilan followed suit, and they settled into their respective beds in the Captain’s cabin that was shared by the family and their servants in the cramped quarters.

“I think I want to call you mommy no matter what. Not quite as sacred as mother and maybe not quite accurate, but you’ve always been there and… I owe you everything,” the girl spoke in soft conviction. “If it was hard for me to adapt, so to have I learned my regrets pale before what might have never been. We’ve sailed to a hundred ports and a hundred islands and I’ve seen a dozen great cities.”

“We have,” Zhen replied, sighing. “Well, I should have expected this sooner or later. How many times have my guns struck home off Peru, or claimed booty from the Philippines. I suppose nobody ever thought they’d have the resources to go after us in wartime, and they’d never think to make war on us alone. I’m sorry, Chilan, that you don’t have your own motherline yet.”

“If I die, there’s your family, and plenty of chances for boon. I have not done wrongly by you… Nor have you ever by me, mommy. Never.” A soft snort and gentle look. “I’ve loved, and that you say you’ve not seen much of beyond your own lands. Isn’t that reason enough for having lived well even if it be short?”

“I do believe I said that to you once. Well! We’ll just have to win if they come alongside. Our crew is far larger than they’ll be expecting and our sides high enough to board even a sixty-four; but you know that I’d have not lived this long betting my fate on such chances. Still, when there’s no hope, remember that you lose nothing by pouring every last strand of strength in heart and soul and brain into the fray.”

“I’ll keep it close to my heart. Such is the way of things, isn’t it?

“Always. Now, since we can’t sleep long, we’ll have to sleep quickly.”

Chilan giggled at the joke, and the shutters were closed, leaving them only the stuffy warm scents of the ship to sleep by.

It was only two glasses later, though, when Chitrala woke them up… To inform Ngui Zhen that the two ships had turned back, around the time another four sail were sighted on the distant horizon. They had been covering some merchants, and their escape to Timor was thus made good. The old privateer—and pirate—though, had a fairly good idea of how long the Empire would be able to hold Timor with Spain and France to join the hostilities and perhaps Portugal to seize the moment. It might well be a port she’d not see again, but if the squadron was intact then perhaps some good could be done.

And a part of her wondered what the Europeans did when they lost a child, and why it seemed right to have one not of her own body call her mother. The answers to those questions, however, were not ones that a privateer, however experienced, had the resources to answer. Soon enough the thoughts passed, and their glowing wake was as pretty as it had been when she was a young girl, now that it did not give them away and doom them to discovery and death. This was the sea, shallow tropical waters lush with life and magic and stars of mystery and knowledge above. Certainly that was one thing she’d never regret, and if violence was to mete out her end she’d see it on the poop of a straining, roaring, fighting ship.

Her eyes settled south for a long moment on that night’s watch. “After all, at least I’ll have tea on the day I die. Not so much luck in a besieged fort… I rather wonder how they treat their captives?”

“We’ll never find out under your command!” the helmswoman shouted proudly, and Zhen was, startled she’d spoken loud enough to be heard, forced only to smile in bemusement at the confidence, and turn to pace on the creaking timbers.


**********************************************


Li Sunu drudged her way up toward the top of the hill which defined the fortress with a book in the fine Chinese style carrying her recent records primly tucked under one arm, it was written in Chinese characters, the better that the invaders couldn't read it. She had not brought Qi Ziyi with her, out of fear of exposing her lover and partner in most of her business operations to the wrath of the foreign religion. Ziyi had protested the whole thing vigorously, but she had been insistent; Li Sunu would take full responsibility for everything, so that at least one of them was apt to make it out of this misfortune alive. And perhaps there would be some good to be done in preserving the local populace, and even some money to be made before the Empress inevitably returned. But it would be a fine line to avoid the Raihiranya from looking miserably upon the financial cooperations with the invaders, and she had to be careful, wary, and had taken the opportunity to ask many questions of kshatra and brahmin of what the limitations on rights and responsibilities of the Vaishya caste in this situation were, and the shudra that the burden had devolved to her caste in the protection thereof.

The incredibly tiny and waiflike Chinese woman with her delicate glasses and long robes was let in after only a long conversation with the guards, who were a bit goggle-eyed surprised at her excellent Spanish; her French was not so good, but inspersed with some latin and Spanish, the languages being so incredibly similar as to nearly be one, she made her way through the castle to where she would be presented before the governor the invaders had sent out, the man by the name of Dupleix; and upon entering his presence, she bowed with the necessary humility. "The trader Li Sunu, as you requested, Your Honour."

A rising career in India had not left a shrewd man like Joseph Dupleix unarmed for dealing with oriental culturs and people. He had established himself in the audience hall of the citadel, where representatives of the ruling power had exercised military governance over the city. Servants brought from Pondicherry attended him dressed in their exotic national costumes, and he himself had made sure to have them prepare his wig and uniform with special care. He was no nobleman, but his wealthy background left him with the stature of one, meaning that he physically dominated the Amazons even more so than he normally did with the Indians. Everything was calculated to impose the same atmosphere that Sunu would have found when summoned before her native authorities.

"You have been summoned to account for the cooperation of the merchants and laborers of the city with their new masters, the Kings of France and Spain." He spoke in French, naturally, with one of the Dutchmen hired on for the expedition serving to relay the speech in Kaetjhasti. And one of his Indian servants, conversant with Dutch, would mind his European counterpart. It was a suitably paranoid arrangement for an oriental court. "The armies of their Majesties require many provisions and supplies which can be provided for by the communities of traders in this city. The orderly reconstruction of the city must also be organized and directed so that the lower castes may dwell in peace and security, and contribute to the produce of this land. Such priorities are fitting to the dharma of a merchant, are they not?"
Li Sunu bowed again at the seriousness of the comment made. "They are, Your Honour. I am quite prepared to fully cooperate, within the realms of custom." She answered directly in Dutch as she wished to remind the Governor of her learning, subtly, for it would seem like a courtesy to the Dutchman as well, and therefore would not be a presumption. "We will see to the happiness of the garrison and its health admirably and with your permission I will work toward arrangements for the reconstruction to be handled by our own people, without troubling Your Honour unduly on such matters. I am the leader of the trading community as it stands in Lajhama and many of the nearby towns and villages and I can have these things done for you, Your Honour."

"It is the duty of a governor to understand the activities of his people, so that he does infringe upon them through ignorance." Dupleix smiled disingenuously. "It will be no trouble to maintain abreast of your plans and reconstruction, and it will allow me to see where the benevolence of their Majesties can be most justly bestowed. I would have you report upon your plans for reconstruction, and for the maintenance of order in the absence of your religious and warrior castes. I must know if our own, as you would say, high castes will need to be aware of a need to intervene and provide such direction in the absence of natives."

"It was our intention, then, Your Honor," Li Sunu answered, "For the eldest woman of each family, the Heads of the Motherlines, as we'd say, save where a group of women are here whose home is far away, but all of them shall also elect one of their number to sit with the honoured matrons; and they will delegate amongst the families the task of collecting and preparing the wood for the building of new houses, and store-houses, and such fishing boats as are needed for the fishing-women and the pearl divers.

“It was also their thought, that this organization shall continue to meet on the sixth day of each week to decide how the people shall conduct themselves, and that the family of the Puransa Brahmin who remain among us, will have referred to their matron, any decisions which they cannot concur upon, and her judgement would be considered law. I was to be given, if it pleased Your Honor, unfettered duties to see to the enactment of any requirement of Your Honour's in regard to taxation and the conduct of the town, and to always speak on behalf of the honoured matrons. Does this arrangement satisfy Your Honour, or shall I convey to them instructions for revisions?"

"The structure is satisfactory," Dupleix responded. Indeed, by giving authority in this body to delegate particular tasks to given motherlines it offered a path of responsibility. If there were failures it would be easy to see what the cause was, and to hold entire motherlines responsible for the behavior of their members. "Records must be kept of the decisions of this council, and which motherlines will be tasked with which actions, and provided to my servants. Since these delegates are being given authority to act in ways affecting the public good, I warn you that they will be held responsible for actions taken on their account. That point should be made abundantly clear to the matrons of your families when they make their selection of delegates."

"No woman would bring harm to her own family, Your Honour, and would present herself dead of poison rather than suffer the shame of having done an act which would bring down suffering upon them, even the Shudra of the lowest case will behave with this basic honour," she bowed reverently again. "The warning shall be clearly made, by that reverence, understood perfectly. I will assign some of my own chosen scribes to take notes of all the decisions of the council of the matrons, and the delegates of those whose matrons reside far away, and to what families and what persons have they assigned various tasks, and I will take responsibility for the honesty of the scribes."

From what he had learned of these amazons collective responsibility would keep the lower castes in line even if given relatively free rein in other ways. Sunu could hardly be trusted as a source of confirmation, but if he was wrong he would at least be free to provide an example of the harsher measures that were available. So he nodded, and dismissed the matter. "I will communicate requests and priorities for reconstruction, should they become necessary, through you. In this role between the administration of their Majesties and the delegates of the lower castes you will, naturally, have a full measure of authority and responsibility. I shall look forward to a speedy re-establishment of normal life in this city."

"Thank you kindly, Your Honour. Are there any needs that Your Honour wishes for me to see to the arrangement of immediately, in regard to the provision of the troops of Their Majesties?"

: "There is of course a steady need for the supply of fresh produce, mutton, pork, grains, fruit, and other foodstuffs from the surrounding countryside." It was much cheaper, and infinitely more palatable, than subsisting on salted pork and hardtack brought in on the ships. "Our troops, if they are not supplied adequately, may begin to filter through the villages and farms of this area and seek food and drink themselves. This could have unfortunate consequences, which I greatly desire to see avoided.

“It would be helpful if the merchants responsible for supplying food to the city, and who have contact with the farmers and provisioners outside, were to work together to insure an adequate supply for our army. We shall, of course, provide renumeration for such efforts at fair rates." Which would, naturally, be somewhat below market prices.

"We will have to range wide to supply your force as you desire, Your Honour," Li Sunu answered. "And this district is, though very fertile, quite depopulated from days of old. Will we have permission to send sampans along the coast to collect food and bring it back from the lesser villages of the coast, and letters of passage addressed toward your navy to prevent the cargoes from being seized? If this is done I believe I can with some certainty, within a fortnight, make regulation provision for enough victuals for thirty thousands of men in addition to the populace of the village."

There was, naturally, every chance to cause some mischief by allowing such freedom of movement, but Dupleix was prepared to allow such risks to keep the army properly victualled. Nothing could be more important for discipline in a long expedition than to ease the privation of the fighting men, and in this case it was extremely important to limit their interaction with the native women. "That will be allowed, and arrangements will be made to provide the required letters of passage. Such letters will be issued to all merchants willing to participate in such efforts, though of course in being provided with such a boon they incur duties as well. They will be responsible for insuring adequate provisions and for the security of their voyages and merchandise."

"This will be easily arranged, Your Honour. Such transport is customary in these lands, anyway, and it is far cheaper than trying to haul it by land, especially since all the horses have been seized, and not many cattle remain in these areas, though those that are here, my caste may put to use for labour when they are properly treated and respected, as perhaps you know from the distant Hindoo lands, Your Honour."

"I am aware of the Indian customs that you share, and have issued orders that the cattle remain unmolested. As long as regular meat supplies are provided to the men they will not be tempted and the officers will find it easy to secure their discipline in this respect." It had been trouble getting the Spanish to agree, given how many of their chaplains seemed eager to organize a wholesale cattle slaughter to spite the idolaters. Still, he had prevailed largely because it provided such a useful incentive for the natives, and he suspected Sunu was intelligent enough to take the implication without his having to state that aloud.

"I understand, Your Honour. The best of the sheep and the hogs will go to them without fail, you may be assured, for the sake of the sanctity of the cattle," Sunu answered rather reverently, and a bit nervously. She had gotten the implication quite clearly.

"Your attention to this matter will be well-appreciated," Dupleix promised her, toying with the small Asian woman to some extent. "I would have you create a listing of merchants involved in the provisioning trade, and keep track of their accounts on a weekly basis so that the names of those who distinguish themselves by their services are known to me." And so that his servants could check the accounts against reports that would be required from the individuals in exchange for their passes.

"Insuring an adequate food supply is a critical matter, and a useful enough role for your merchants in this campaign. However, the army will require other materials and resources that the traders of this city may be in a position to supply for greater profits and advantage. The production of liquor, uniforms, rope, naval stores, and of course gunpowder stand out among manufactures important to an army. Are there among the merchants those involved in the production of such items, or willing to procure them on behalf of their Majesties?"

"Liquor and uniforms, ropes, and the various provisions of ships may be provided in considerable quantity and this can be arranged by the villages of the trade to be delivered here and hence to the fleet and to the men of your army as required," Li Sunu answered, and then composed herself, standing a bit straighter. "However, under our laws and customs, and by the dictum that we must still conduct ourselves as loyal servants of the kshatra of the realm until such time as we have, with our land, been turned over to your rulers in turn per a treaty specifying that change in sovereignty, I must respectfully abjure from the provision of gunpowder, as it counts as a weapon, to your forces, or any other sort of weapon.

“Though it is expected that we provide shelter, uniforms, food, medicines, and these other provisions to an occupying army, by our custom, to provide weapons to the army of the enemy of our sovereign, is as to bear them against her; and until She who is the Sun has given this land over to you, this we cannot do. If you want my head for it, you will surely take it, and that of most of my subordinates besides. We are prepared to cooperate, but only within the limits of our custom, and that is the limitation of our custom."

"So you say," Dupleix smiled again, as though enjoying a private joke. "Perhaps many of your merchants would say. Would all of them? They have seen our armies conquer this citadel, and see their leaders as our captives. Will all of them turn down an opportunity to profit, and to ingratiate themselves with their future rulers?"

"Your Honour," Li Sunu answered, and she did not appear nervous, but rather serene. "Please understand that my merchant concern is a cosmopolitan one. You know I speak your languages--I do not hail from this humble little backwater of the Empire. I am from the city of Xiquan in Tingfuéh province and my family is powerful there.... And so do also most of the merchants here, come from families whose matrons and relatives live in distant Zealandia. You may indeed be the victors and subjagate even those realms, but if we aide you against our custom and it is known in our homelands, our families will suffer accordingly long before you reach there."

"If it would be any small recompense, we know of many groves of cardamom, pepper, nutmeg, coffee, and other fine spices and plants which grow along these shores. Let me make a provision of them to you, free of charge and as an additional labour upon us, if this will assuage your displeasure."

So it seemed the Empress had her own handle on her subjects through collective responsibility of the motherlines. Dupleix filed that away as potentially useful information, if it could be confirmed. And he had no intention of just accepting Sunu's word that none of the local merchants would cooperate, but... did she say spices and coffee? "That is an interesting proposal you have made. This land seems as suitable as those taken by the Dutch for the production of spices in demand in the rest of the world." The profits, and provided at no cost! "What quantities of such products would you be able to provide?"

At this, Li Sunu smiled with what Dupleix would only see as the predatory brilliance of the Cantonese, and dared to gesture grandly. "Your Honour, over the next season, three months of time, if you let me send my trading junks out along the coast you control with teams of conscripted labour from the villages, we will bring in enough to fill this audience room twice over with nutmeg, once times with cardamom, once with coffee, and four times with pepper."

"You terms are acceptable," he replied, deceptively calm at the magnitude of the wealth involved in such a provision, for the audience room was at least the size of the holds of an Indiaman. "I will of course handle the arrangements personally. In return, you and your merchants will be relieved of the duty to provide weapons, including gunpowder, to our armies. Though I will insist you establish which resources and materials are beyond your customs to provide, and to adhere to the list and nothing more." The wisdom of the expedition seemed rather less in doubt, now.

"As you command, Your Honour. I will present the list within three days after consultations with the wisest among us who know best our customs, and it will be adhered to, and not any more..."