The next day, all hell began to break loose on the Boiling Plains. Since the Plains were already at least hell-adjacent, this wasn’t really much of a change, unless one happened to be in the thick of the action.

It started with the arrival of emissaries from the Hongse Clan, a group of five women clad in white who simply appeared at the edge of the orc encampment. Lilijoy was sitting at one of the many warming pits with Anda, Skria, Naduk and a mix of orcs from the various totems, enjoying sparse conversation in the cold morning air. None of them needed to eat, but they were drinking a hot beverage orcs had brewed from the leaf of plants they called sourflame, which, as one might expect from the name, caused her nose to wrinkle and her mouth to burn and tingle with every sip.

Orc tea party! she was in the midst of thinking when the emissaries’ arrival stirred the camp, first with shouts of alarm and then the thunder of feet. As she and Skria got to their feet, an Urglah ran up to them and, politely, asked them to remain out of view. Thus, it wasn’t until Anda got them caught up a bit later that they learned what transpired.

The emissaries informed the orcs of a massive battle to come on the Boiling Plains, and suggested, in no uncertain terms, that they keep to themselves for a few days. When she heard this, Lilijoy couldn’t help but be impressed by Hongse’s grasp of the situation on the Plain and their knowledge of orc culture. Clearly the orc’s situation was more complex than she had assumed earlier, if at least one of the clans knew to approach them with a group of females. Given they were Outsiders, that wouldn’t be enough to keep the orcs from harming them, but it would certainly lead to better outcome than confronting them with a group of males.

The group from Hongse, having passed along their message, was allowed to depart, which surprised Lilijoy a little, until she heard the Matrons had encouraged it. She even saw them leave, flying on a great white swan. From that point on, events fell like dominoes, one atop another.

Lilijoy had just sat down on her chosen rock and raised the crude clay cup of sourflame tea to her lips when a ghastly wailing sound broke out, followed by the call of great horns.

“The Matrons will speak,” said Naduk. He looked shaken.

Lilijoy felt like an outsider, a spectator in these people’s lives. She glanced at Skria. “Are we allowed...” she began to ask, then halted when she saw Naduk’s expression.

“That is not...” he said, before coming to a halt of his own. “It is strange,” he said, starting again. “You are not orcs. It seems you live in a different world. There is no ‘allowed’. There are actions,” he said, hitting a palm with the back of the other hand, “and consequences.” He switched hands and repeated the gesture, then stood abruptly and walked away.

“What was that?” Skria asked. “Should we follow him?”

Lilijoy could only shrug. “If we want to hear the Matrons.”

That being the case, they stood and fell in behind Naduk.

“Do you think Jess will be there? I’m worried. What if...”

Lilijoy mostly tuned out Skria’s latest recitation of concern. Her friend had a way of coming up with a great variety of catastrophic scenarios. She felt bad for her, but after the fifth or six version of all the bad things that could have happened to Jess, including timeless classics such as ‘Jess has been charmed into forgetting us’, and ‘Jess has been turned into a mindless orc baby factory’, Lilijoy had had enough.

They walked for far longer than expected, through the sprawling males’ encampment, a maze of structures neither tent nor building, but some unfortunate combination of the two, then through training grounds and housing for the untempered young. More and more orcs fell in around them. A band of Urkulps in tattered leather loped past on the left, and they were nearly run over by a formation of spear-wielding Orusk who charged up from behind, snorting and slobbering as they jogged by.

Eventually, they arrived at a huge bowl-shaped depression, almost a stadium, though it was impossible to tell if it was natural or not. There, the orcs had self assembled into five wedges around the center. It was Lilijoy’s first chance to get a real sense of the orcs’ population as a whole and within each totem. Anda’s group, the Urglah, were by far the least numerous, less than a tenth of the whole, with the other four totems fairly equal.

There was no sign of the Matrons, just an open space in the center, ringed by small standing stones. They found a spot high enough on the rim of the bowl to see over the thousands of heads below and settled in to wait. Lilijoy tried to find Anda amid the crowd of Urglah, with no luck. Despite being a half-orc, he really didn’t look much different than the full blooded. Perhaps his ears were a touch less pointed, his teeth a bit smaller and his fur a bit more sparse. While she looked, she thought about their conversation the night before.

“I finally got an audience with a Matron,” he told her. “You weren’t kidding when you said they were intimidating. Made me feel like I was five.”

“And?”

He grinned, flashing his sharp teeth. “It’s on.”

“You mean you can...”

“...finally tell you what Nandi asked me to do in exchange for my rebirth.”

She had clapped her hands in delight, which drew the attention of several Urglah who were lounging on the other side of the warming pit where the conversation was taking place. The pits were just that, holes crudely dug to take advantage of the geothermal warmth beneath their feet. According to Naduk, they hardly ever collapsed, filled with boiling water, or otherwise mortally inconvenienced their residents.

Glaring back at the cat-featured orcs, Anda had switched to messaging through their systems.

The memory played out in her head.

“...They gave the children systems really young, like five, six.” Anda was saying, “The only time they spent Outside was for eating and exercise. The goal was to make unstoppable warriors for the clan’s Inside development, but instead they got mental illness, stagnated growth and… other weirdness. It’s one of the reasons the Maasai now send in their youth relatively late.”

Lilijoy was almost afraid to ask. “Other weirdness?”

Anda grimaced. “It’s all campfire stories at this point, a forbidden topic. Some of them refused to log out and their Outside bodies eventually died. The rumor is that they became ghosts on the Inside, demons who hunted any young child from the clan who came in. Others became… detached from their Outside bodies, changing their Inside forms in impossible ways. When they would log out, they were violent and unpredictable, and many of them were eventually killed on the Outside.”

she replied, shivering through the waves of rising warmth.

Lilijoy waited for him to continue, but Anda was lost in his thoughts.

she prodded, wishing there was a fire to watch. The warming pits were, well, warm against the chill night air, but they didn’t have much in the way of ambiance. Wood was far too valuable to burn, so they sat in the dark, though all present had excellent Low Light Vision, or equivalent abilities.

She snapped back to the present when horns blew, announcing the arrival of the Matrons. Three figures that towered over the assembled males entered the natural stadium from the far end. The assembled orcs knelt as they passed, their faces upturned and proud. These Matrons were even bigger than Melloby, who Lilijoy had met earlier, and they were clad in many layers of dark leather that draped around their forms. She couldn’t help but be reminded of Jessila’s mode of dress, though unlike her friend’s cow hides, this leather was dark, polished, and looked as if it would weigh hundreds of pounds.

I wonder if Jess knew at some level that she was mimicking the dress of her ancestors?

She had learned little bits and pieces of Jessila’s story from Skria over the past couple days, mostly due to the Petauran girl’s utter inability not to ramble. Her mother was half-elven, half-human, her father an Orsur orc. She was raised by her mother until she died when Jess was still little. After that, she found a home in some stables at the edge of a human town. She had never met her father, and Lilijoy couldn’t help but wonder if he might be found in the masses below.

It seemed unlikely, as most of the orc population outside the Boiling Plains was untempered, boys who ran away when they were unable to complete their soul quest.

The Matrons reached the clearing on the center and stood shoulder to shoulder in an outward facing triangle.

“Fathers and fathers to be, we bring good news.” said one.

“Matron Melloby has given birth to ten sons.” said the next.

“We grow ever stronger.” said the third.

Their voices were powerful and profound, somehow a deep bass and feminine at the same time.

“Sons and brothers, we wish to note the achievement of the newest among you.”

“Rise, Naduk, Vanquisher, Urkaen and son of Susallah.”

There was a subdued murmur, as the orc males turned their heads to see where Naduk stood, near the back of the Urkaens.

“Naduk you are recognized for bringing to us a prize of inestimable value.”

Lilijoy’s heart beat a little faster, and she glanced over at Skria.

“An Orc Maid has returned!”

A sharp roar went up from the males and Skria elbowed Lilijoy. “There she is!”

At the edge of the gathering, Jessila emerged, now clad in the same dark, flowing leathers as the Matrons. She began to walk to the center, the layers of cloak-like garments covering her from head to foot.

“Jessila is a sign to us from the Archon,” one of the Matrons continued, once the tumult subsided.

“Within her is a bloodline thought lost in the years of death.”

“Her orc blood dominates the blood from the other races.”

“As will ever the orcs dominate.”

“We conquer and take those strengths within ourselves!”

Jessila had reached the Matrons, and one of them reached down to remove her hood, revealing the long golden hair marking her elven heritage.

There was a moment of stunned silence. Then the males began to chant the word ‘conquer’ with growing intensity. The Matrons nodded in approval, and Jessila stood, her face now utterly impassive. After a minute, the Matrons raised one hand each, and the chant stopped.

“With this sign from the Archon, it is time!” one said.

“Warriors, it is time to show our strength.”

“It is time to establish our dominance over the disputed areas next to our homeland.”

“Today we take the first step toward ending our exile!”

“Today we will show the Hated that we have not forgotten!”

And now, for the first time, Jessila spoke.

“We go to war!”

The thunderous chant of the males’ response echoed in Lilijoy’s ears for minutes after the assembly dispersed.

***

After the assembly, the orcs launched into action, forming groups of various sizes and composition and heading in various directions. Skria ignored the commotion and made a beeline for Jess, gliding down to her. Lilijoy followed on foot, doing her best to avoid the very real prospect of being trampled be extremely focused and motivated orcs.

By the time she reached the center, waving away the dust left behind by a thousand orc feet, she saw that Skria was perched on Jessila’s shoulder, both of them overshadowed by the three Matrons who looked on with tolerant expressions. She hesitated just a bit when all three of the nine-foot leather-draped behemoths turned their gaze to her.

“You may approach, small human,” one of them said. “Melloby and Jessila have spoken of and for you. You have a role to play in what will come, if you so desire.”

“Thank you, Grand Matron is it?” Lilijoy called back.

All three nodded, evidently less willing to engage in informality than Melloby had been. Lilijoy squeezed between the standing stones. She wasn’t a huge fan of hugs, less because of any inhibition than because almost everyone was so much taller than she was, which just made the whole endeavor awkward. Nonetheless, she made an exception, planting her face just above Jess’s hip. The leathers she wore were faintly scaled, but smooth and softer than they looked. She couldn’t quite place the smell, but it was definitely better than the roughly crafted hides Jess had worn for so long.

“I missed you,” she said, once she had backed up enough to take in her friend’s face. “Congratulations?”

Jess smiled back at her but didn’t say anything.

“Come,” came the voice of a matron from above their heads. “There is much to discuss, and little time.”

They followed the three towering figures out of the natural stadium, exchanging hushed conversation as they went.

“So really, Jess, is everything okay? What have you been doing?” Lilijoy asked.

“Learning,” she replied. “They accepted me quickly.”

“Then why couldn’t I see you?” Skria complained. “I was so worried!”

Jessila ignored her question. “Everything makes sense now. The Matrons are very wise. They know much more than anyone would expect.”

“What do you mean by that?” asked Lilijoy, hoping this didn’t indicate Jess had been brainwashed somehow. It sounded a little like something someone who had been charmed might say.

“You’ll see. They’ve been waiting for a very long time. They also have a message for you.”

“From who?”

“From the last Child of Guardian. From Sarah.”

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