The ranch’s training was done by Isaiah Hall based on US Special Forces training in hand-to-hand combat. Luke had always firmly believed it represented the best possible fighting style. His confidence was now shaken badly.
One thing that Luke had always wondered about was becoming clear. The Judo book talked about the style as though it were a lifestyle or a life-long discipline. Luke had never quite understood that until now. Now, he was watching people who had devoted years to the perfection of their style. There were many black belts, indicating high-ranked and well-trained practitioners. A couple of the older warriors wore white belts, the beginner’s color, even though they were obviously very skilled. Luke remembered what the book had said about that and explained to Daniel and Kurt that these warriors were at the highest possible rank; they had gone full circle.
The biggest surprise of the night was Kurt. Kurt and Luke had drilled in Judo throws for some time before the beginning of the mission. A complete failure at the harder style favored at the ranch, Kurt had quietly taken the lessons to heart. Also, he was less sure of himself and, therefore, more cautious. He did not fall for the more obvious tricks of the Greenbowes.
He even managed to unseat his first opponent, throwing them over his shoulder with a triumphant cry. The Greenbowes cheered as loudly for him as they had for their own, and the tension among the boys dropped dramatically. For all the intensity, it was indeed a friendly game.
The fighting went on well into the night. They each fought several times and often the Greenbowes fought amongst each other. These were the fun matches to watch. They pitted skilled warriors, people who knew each other’s style well, against each other. The results were impressive.
Even Patrick appeared to relax and enjoy himself. He had spent nearly a half an hour scowling and glowing red after his first match. Then Spider took the field again. She took on six fighters in turn, many of them much larger. She was fast and clever. She used a combination of fluid throws, “Aikido,” Michael confirmed from Luke’s side. She also used tighter vicious holds and throws that Michael identified as Brazilian Jujitsu.
“See, Patrick?” Mark said. “It’s no shame to have lost to that woman. She’s one tough bitch!”
Luke startled at the statement, expecting a sudden flare of wrath from Spider. But she merely smiled at him. “Damn straight,” she told Mark. “Want a piece?”
It was over in seconds, and to Luke’s surprise, Mark didn’t appear the least bit put out as he limped back out of the circle.
Toward the end, Maestro Lorn took the center ring, gesturing to three separate people. “He always waits until the end,” Michael explained. “His Tai Chi is fabulous, but it is more impressive after you’ve seen the others fight.”
Luke didn’t know what Tai Chi was, but he had to agree. If he hadn’t seen the men fight before, he wouldn’t have thought much of Lorn’s movements, which came off as light and easy. He didn’t appear to be doing much, but each of the three fighters went down. It was as though they had suddenly developed two left feet.
All three attacked at once and were repulsed easily. While Lorn’s movements were effortless, his opponents were often thrown several feet. It was an impressive demonstration.
“You have us at a great disadvantage,” Luke announced when asked how he had enjoyed the circle. “We surrender to your superior skill.” There was another cheer at this graceful admission.
“Nonsense,” Lorn returned. “You stood against some of our most skilled warriors. Many have more years of training than you have years. It was an honorable match, and you acquitted yourselves well.” Another cheer went up followed by the popping of corks as mead bottles were opened.
Chapter 10
ROBIN'S NEST
Amy had one moment to watch the other’s leave for the warriors circle before Lexa dragged her back to her family home. Returning to the nest, they found Rowan waiting for them. He wore tight leather breeches and a light blue tunic with long sleeves. With his long, blond hair pulled back in a tight braid, he looked quite handsome. Amy thought,
I can see why Lexa fell for him first.
“Hello, my dears,” he said kissing both Lexa and Daisy soundly on the lips. “And hello to you,” he added to Amy, kissing her hand. She blushed.
“Such a gentlemen,” Daisy said a bit too loud, winking.
“And why shouldn’t I be?” he replied, “With such a beautiful guest in our house?”
“Don’t embarrass her,” Lexa laughed.
Embarrass me
.
Inside, Luther was doing some knitting. Amy almost burst out laughing at the sight of that great bear of a man very carefully knitting socks. It was a tight weave in a pattern that Amy recognized but had never mastered, despite her mother’s many lessons.
What would mom think of all this?
She pushed the thought down.
Winonna came in next. She was tall and thin with a sharp nose, small hips, and a narrow waist. Despite this, she was quite attractive, as Merlin told her as he kissed her. She had three kids at her heels, two of them little more than toddlers.
“I believe it’s your turn with these rapscallions,” she told Luther.
Luther put his knitting up and towered over the kids. They stared up at him with wide, amused eyes. “Well, let’s get you rapscallions ready for supper,” he said, shooing them gently with his massive hands. He led them away, the youngest toddling after and calling “papa woofer” gleefully. They came back promptly, hands wet from washing.
Daisy led them into the dining room. Even though she was the shortest, she managed to give the distinct impression of towering over the others. Merlin went into the kitchen and came out moments later with a tray of roasted vegetables.
As if the sight of Luther knitting hadn’t been enough, there was Merlin. He was small, dark haired, and compact, with a dark intensity about him, standing there in a brightly colored apron.
“Is it a holiday?” the older boy asked. Erick was his name, Amy remembered. The girl was Sky and the youngest Ewan.
“Yes,” Daisy replied. “It’s our first chance to play host to our new guest, Amy.”
The meal was long and leisurely. Despite her day-old promise to never drink again, she took a few sips, and then a glass, of the wine Merlin offered. They ate and spoke lightly of their day.
After the meal was done, they retired to the veranda. Luther produced a small flute from somewhere and began to play. It was a light, airy tune, and the kids danced madly to it.
“A jig, my good sir,” Rowan cried.
Luther began a faster tune, and Rowan danced gracefully. Daisy leaped up and joined him. Lexa grabbed Amy by the hand and led her through the steps of the dance.
Merlin disappeared inside and returned with two drums. He sat down and began playing one. Ewan toddled over and beat crudely on the other until Winnie took it from him.
After a while, Daisy took the flute from Luther and Merlin handed him the drum. The two started a slow, stately piece. Merlin bowed deeply to Lexa and Amy, but it was Amy’s hand that he took. He led her through the simple but elegant dance.
So the evening passed. As the shadows lengthened across the path and oil lamps appeared at neighboring houses, Luther led the children inside for bed. Merlin lit lamps on the porch, and Daisy produced a small bottle of a rich, red wine.
In the quiet, Amy could hear music from the other houses. It was a comforting sound that wafted with the breeze through the forest. Luther returned, and they sat and talked well into the night.
Amy could just make out an image of dancers at the next house.
These are the children of a new earth,
she thought, and the phrase swam through her head long after she went to bed that night.
“Amy!” a voice cried as people started coming out of the workshop. She craned to see. It was not Lexa, as expected, but Daisy.
“How was your day?” Daisy asked.
“Good,” Amy replied. It had been interesting. She had spent most of the day helping Merlin bake bread in the family’s mud oven.
“Men cook here?” she had Merlin.
“We eat,” he’d replied. “Why wouldn’t we cook? Besides, this is more like doing magic.”
That answer had intrigued Amy enough for her to offer to help. She wasn’t sure what she had expected—him doing incantations and whatnot?
Instead, they had mixed water, flour, and yeast . . . and kneaded and kneaded. Merlin talked the whole time, explaining about the four elements; earth, water, fire and air. The oven was made of earth, fire was built within. Water was mixed into the flour, and with yeast, the bread rose, bringing in air.
It was all very fascinating, and she had learned a lot. For one thing, she now had names to go with the dark heavy loaves she had already learned to love. The dark brown ones were rye, the black loaves were pumpernickel, and the golden ones were barley. The sharp tasting ones were sourdough, made with wild yeasts that were left to work, sometimes for days, before the bread was baked.
Fascinating though it was, it was baking, and that had never been Amy’s forte. By midafternoon, she was bored, so when Merlin had asked if she wanted to go meet Lexa at the workshop, she had quickly agreed.
“My sweety,” Daisy greeted Merlin, giving him a kiss. “Lexa’s going to be a few minutes. She was working on a nasty problem.”
They sat down under a small oak tree to wait. Lexa came out moments later, covered in grease and soot. “I need a bath,” she declared.
“What happened to you?” Amy asked.
“Working on an old diesel generator some village sent in. They have been burning straight oil in it, not converting it to biodiesel, for almost a year. It’s a mess.”
“Yeah, they did that at the ranch in one of the tractors before my dad got there. He was pissed.”
Daisy frowned. “I always thought that was okay?”
“It runs okay,” Amy explained, “so most of the old books say so. But it’s a lot dirtier than after it’s been processed. If you run it for long without cleaning . . . well, look.” She pointed at Lexa.
“That’s going to be awful to clean,” Daisy said frowning.
“Me or the suit?” Lexa asked.
“Both, but you are the first priority. Straight to the bathhouse for you. And leave that here; you’ll streak grease everywhere.”
Lexa stripped the jumpsuit off and smiled at Daisy. “Ready for my bath, Mama Daisy,” she joked.
“Get on, you stinker,” Daisy said as she herded them off.
No one seemed surprised by Lexa’s nakedness, so Amy didn’t comment. They apparently had very different views on that.
“Like your outfit,” one young man commented cheekily as Lexa passed. She bowed to him. Everyone else ignored them.
Amy was halfway across the shower room floor before she realized she had stripped and joined the others without thinking about Merlin’s presence. She was not particularly embarrassed, but rather shocked by her own easy acceptance of their customs.
Amy, being relatively clean, stood beside Daisy and helped, handing her shampoo as she scrubbed and scrubbed. “The worst part,” Lexa moaned, “is that it will be at least another two days at this rate.”
“One,” Amy told her, “with my help.”
“Oh, thank you, thank you,” Lexa cried hugging her hand.
“Well, that is the last one,” Lexa said, sliding the glass plate across the table.
“Good, I’m beat,” Amy said. Despite her appreciation of Winnie’s loan of clean clothes, she was even more appreciative when Susan, who was teaching the boys to drive the EVs, offered to loan her several gray jumpsuits. They were the almost universal attire within the workshop. It was also an image she was more comfortable with, and like Lexa, she generally wore the jumpsuits home at the end of the day.
They had spent the last several days cleaning the diesel generator and rebuilding a couple of old wind generators. Now Lexa was teaching Amy the finer points of assembling solar panels.
“Thanks to your help, we are ahead of schedule,” Lexa said, peering over a clipboard. “So why don’t we knock off a little early and go for a bath? I could die for a long soak.”
“Sure,” Amy agreed. Her initial reluctance to use the public bath was long gone. She wondered how many of the others had made the same leap. She had seen Shawn down there once, getting his hair washed by one of the Moondancer’s women. Surely it had been her idea. She had also spied Kurt leaving the bathhouse one morning, which surprised her.
As they soaked in the hot water, a middle-aged man with graying, blond hair and a short beard splashed in beside them. Amy had met him once or twice and greeted him. “Lars, how are you?”
Lars was one of the driving instructors for the boys. Amy hadn’t actually talked to any of them in almost two days.
“Not bad,” Lars said, “but I feel grimy. We took the EVs down on the river course, to give everyone some practice on rough terrain.”
“How are they doing?”
“Not bad. Driving an EV is not rocket science, as we used to say in the old days,” he replied. “They are doing well, though. They’ll be ready by the time the cargo is.” He looked around. “I’m kind of surprised that I am the only one down here. I wasn’t the grimiest one by far.”
Amy knew that most of the houses had individual showers and baths for convenience and was sure that Luke and probably Patrick would use them. Mark and Shawn probably didn’t care if they were dirty.
An old lady nearby snorted loudly. “That big one, Shawn, he only comes down here when my little Rose suggests it. He’s taken to her, I can tell you. Her husbands are trying to be good natured about it, but I don’t think they’ll be too sad to see him go.”
“I saw a couple of the Dog Boys come by for Kurt,” Lars said. “So he’s up at their little outdoor bath, no doubt.”
“The Dog Boys?” Amy asked in surprise. “You mean the warriors?” She wasn’t sure what surprised her more: Kurt with the warriors, or the reputation the Dog Boys had at the tribe.
“Yeah, does that surprise you?” Lars asked.