Lucius wasn't a slave or an illiterate peasant; he was an untamed male swordsman, who had freely chosen this path in life. This made him rather special in the eyes of most Amazons. And while some Amazons were repelled by the sight of him and considered him potentially dangerous, others like Commander Heliodora and Captain Dementria were sexually attracted to him and his unmolested figure. Myria in turn just stuck up with him, because he was well-liked by both her beloved Eudoxia and the Amazon Queen. In Myria's eyes, Lucius was just a lover, not the love of her life. He was a temporary bed-warmer and a sexual partner. And when she was in a good mood, she would even refer to him as a good friend and a fellow comrade in arms, but that was it. Eudoxia was the love of her life, but Myria had to make do with Lucius instead of Eudoxia for the time being.

And as anticipated, Lucius had caused her trouble, but then again; what else he could do? He was an untamed male from the west, resourceful and self-esteemed. Yet, his trespasses against her in the past did not matter now that she was back in her rightful place with her sisters of arms, and therefore she was happy and smiling again. But even out here in the battlefields of the Amazon nation, which was the true element of commander Myria, the shadow of Lucius still followed her and that irritated her immensely.

"Oh, he's just fine," Myria said and gave a bright fake smile. "Except that he can't walk anymore and he has to eat his food through a straw," Myria added indifferently while she enjoyed watching the horrid look on Heliodora's face.

"I'm just joking," Myria quickly added, while she giggled like a naughty schoolgirl. "I didn't hurt him as you instructed."

Well, at least I didn't break any bones, she added to herself.

Heliodora in turn was relieved that Lucius was unscathed, but was also rather annoyed with Myria's lack of respect.

"Your sarcasm is not welcome here, Commander Myria," Heliodora lectured her. "You better keep that in mind!"

Then Commander Heliodora addressed the other commanders and officers at the Amazon war counsel. Firstly, everyone had to be briefed on the current military situation. Then later, they would lay out the battle plans together.

The phony war of the Colchians:

"Ladies, let's face the situation," The commander of the Eastern Front by the name of Sonyanua took the floor. "And I have to tell you this; it does not look good!"

"For nearly five years we have lived in peace with the Colchians, the strongest nation to the east. But now a full-scale war is coming."

"They must have run out of neighbouring tribes to fight, so now they are looking to fight us instead," Myria commented.

"They have recently gathered a large army close to our border, but still they just wait there, while they taunt and provoke us, trying to lure us out to face them in the open battlefield."

"But I, the Eastern Frontline Commander do not have numbers to engage them, and even with the reinforcements that our noble Queen has sent me these last days, we are still approximately 1000 warriors short in order to match them."

"However, we Amazons make do with what we got and not what we wish for."

The enemy army at the border counted approximately 5000 men and the amount of warriors that Sonyanua had gathered under the Amazon banner in the east counted little over 4000.

With no natural borders like rivers or mountains to protect them to the east, the Amazons therefore had to strengthen the ring of outposts which made up the defences against their enemies to the east of Amazonia. However, the Colchians sent out small patrols to randomly perform hit-and-run attacks on the Amazon outposts.

Sonyanua gave the floor to a veteran Amazon by the name of Drakonis, who was the Captain of an Amazon outpost, which had suffered such a Colchian sneak attack. The Captain explained that one moonless night, a small band of black-clothed Colchians snuck up to wall of her outpost and poured a mixture of tar and flammable oil on the wall. Then from a safe distance, the Colchians set the whole section of the wall ablaze with fire-arrows.

When the Amazons were alerted by the flames, they rushed outside to form a line with water buckets passing from hand to hand. They did not suspect foul play at this moment and didn't realize that they were just sitting-ducks in front of the enemy who lurked in the dark. Suddenly, a rain of arrows hit the Amazon firefighters and then Captain Drakonis realized that she and her outpost were under siege.

Drakonis ordered her warriors to retreat inside the encampment, because the Amazons could not hide in the dark due to the fire, while the Colchians fired arrows at the Amazons from safe distance out in the dark. Now the Amazons could only fight the fire from the inside the wall and not outside it. However, with great difficulty, Captain Drakonis and her warriors manged to put out the fire.

Even still, the section of the wall was heavily damaged by the fire and had to be repaired, but when the Amazon repairwomen started working on it early the next day, a band of horse-riding Colchians suddenly attacked again, killing some and wounded several. And before the Amazons could counter-attack, the Colchian squad quickly retreated and vanished into the nearby woods.

"They are using our own tactics against us nowadays," Myria commented.

The Amazons at the targeted outpost now had a taste of Amazon's own medicine and they did not like the taste of it at all. The Amazons had to form a defensive line in front of damaged wall section and protect the workers behind their shields, while they finished repairing the damaged wall section.

After this ordeal, Captain Drakonis of the outpost sent a patrol out to attack the nearest Colchian village. They burned down all the thatched huts and killed a significant amount of male villagers at fighting age as retaliation for the Colchian attack on her outpost. The Amazons took the rest of the male population at fighting age prisoners, leaving only old men and young boys and the all women unharmed. The prisoners would serve as hostages inside the Amazon encampments along the border; should the Colchian army attack again, the hostages would die a slow painful death.

This tactic was supposed force the Colchian army to post protection forces in the nearby villages and thereby weaken their current position. However, when Queen Hentiope learned of the incidents at the eastern front, she immediately sent word to the eastern Front Commander that such barbaric tactics was not allowed. Unarmed peasants were not to be attacked under any circumstances, unless they had engaged the fighting themselves.

Instead, the Queen ordered Front Commander Sonyanua to attack the main Colchian army and promised to send her reinforcements in order to perform this task. And so it came, that Myria and her young Amazons were sent to the east to join the fight against the Colchians.

Myria presents her battle plans at the war-counsel

At the war-counsel Myria was very excited and therefore couldn't keep her mouth shut during the briefing. This was the first time that Myria participated in an Amazon war-council with the rank of a Commander. She had attended war-councils before, but only to be briefed without the right to speak. But now her opinion matted, she had a natural right to speak and her voice would be listened to. However, the other Commanders present in the war room soon grew annoyed with her endless commentating, and therefore hissed at her when Myria got too loud during the briefing.

When the briefing finally ended, the commanders started to discuss how to thwart the threat of the Colchian army. Commander Sonyanua and Captain Drakonis initially started laying some initial battle-plans out. They were both old-school Amazons and fond of the traditional Amazon tactics; Instead of meeting the enemy in the open battle field, they would rather lure or provoke the enemy into a trap, where they could ambush them. When their enemies were cramped inside a narrow place, the Amazon arrow rain would create disorder within the ranks in an army too numerous for their leaders to control in dire straits.

However, these tactics was not to the liking of Commander Myria, who wanted confrontation and a quick annihilation of the Colchian enemies, rather than a slow painful strangulation.

"I have had enough of ambushes and tramps. I will have no more, where is your dignity, ladies?" Myria stepped forward and took the floor.

"These male pigs have killed noble females. Let's go out and get them. Are we women who fights in the daylight or we worms who lurk in the dark?" Myria asked rhetorically.

"Does Commander Myria wish to share something with the war counsel?" Sonyanua barked at her.

"We must stop cowering inside our outposts, while they try to smoke us out like common rats. We must ride out and face the enemy in the open battlefield, plain and simple!"

"And let us ride headlong into a trap?" Drakonis asked.

"If one is aware of the danger which is facing us up ahead, it can hardly become a trap, if we use our heads for thinking instead of nagging!" Myria said and stood firm.

"Please elaborate, Commander Myria," Commander Heliodora said out loud.

Now that Heliodora, a standing member of the Amazon high command and the Commander-in-Chief of this war had spoken, and obviously wanted hear what Myria had to say, everybody at the war counsel went silent and instead turned towards to Myria to hear what she had to say. Myria in turn knew that she had to choose her words carefully now. Myria took a deep breath then she addressed the other commanders and officers at the Amazon war counsel.

"Dear Ladies, what I suggest is a feint within a feint," Myria began.

"Let us await their next provocation, and then we will pretend that we take the bait and ride out to face the Colchian army in the open battlefield. However, by pretending that we have lost our heads and run into their trap, we shall instead lay a trap for them!"

"And how do we take them on? Their spears will kill our horses and their spearmen are in turn well protected from our arrows behind their shields," Sonyanua correctly pointed out. "Not to mention their archers will relentlessly fire at us from behind their spearmen."

"We shall ride towards them at full speed, pretending to take bait and charge the Colchians head-on. They will in turn raise their spears in order to stab our horses, but in the last moment, we shall turn and then jump from our horses, duck underneath their spears and then cut through their ranks on foot."

Myria wasn't a scholar, who moved figurines around on the table of the war room table in order to visualize her battle plans. She was a combat soldier, who fought in the first line. Therefore, she threw herself at the floor while she moved forward, ducked and hacked away at imaginary enemies in order to illustrate her battle plans. The other commanders backed off in order not to accidently get wounded during Myria's performance.

"Thank you for a very vivid explanation, Commander," Heliodora complimented Myria, when she had finished her explanation and got back on her feet again.

"However, what Lady Myria is trying to say is: We shall breach the enemy's defences open in the middle, making way for our elite veteran warriors to charge in. But we can only succeed if we simultaneously attack them also with arrows in the flanks, forcing our enemy to thin out the defences in the middle."

"This can work in theory, but it might as well prove to be catastrophic! This is a high-risk manoeuvre, Commander Myria. There will be confusion, loose horses running in and out, arrows flying around, hitting friend and foe alike."

"And who will perform this very delicate attack," Sonyanua enquired.

"My girls of course!" Myria promptly said.

"Your raw recruits?" Sonyanua asked in disbelief.

"My girls are like daughters to me and they can do the job!" Myria was resolved to put her girls to the test.

"They are maybe young and lightweight, but they are also fast and agile. They are well trained and ready to fight and that's what they are here for. My girls are perfect for a delicate job like this."

"They have been training this manoeuvre at the training ground under my leadership. Well, at least part of it. However, they should know how to handle themselves in the battlefield by now and they can easily learn the rest as quickly as my lecherous spouse can get his eager tongue inside my pussy."

"War in the open battlefield is not the same as drill manoeuvres on the training ground," Drakonis objected.

"I know. We can mix their ranks with some veteran warriors, but let my girls be the bulk of the attack force," Myria said.

"Very well then, but who will lead them?" Heliodora politely asked.

"Me of course!" Myria proclaimed. "I have supervised the young girls training ever since they arrived at my outpost. The girls trust my like their mother and they will gladly follow me up the ass of Lady Gaia herself."

Myria had a special bond to this particular batch of Amazon warriors, because these girls arrived at the Amazon training ground at the same time as Myria.

"If you say so, Commander," Heliodora said calmly. "But you and your light armoured troops will need heavy armoured backup or else the Colchian counter-attack will squash you and your troops like insects."

It was obvious that Myria's mind was set on leading her batch of new recruits directly into the fray of the upcoming battle. However, Heliodora decided to let Myria have her way and added her own suggestions to Myria's proposed battle-plan.

"We need to send in heavy foot-soldiers right behind you. They must secure and strengthen the breach, while your troops must continue fighting on and cut down the Colchian archers."

"They in turn think themselves invulnerable behind their spearmen. They too will be taken by surprise and once we annihilate the Colchian archers, the battle will swing to our favour."

"Our horse-riding archers shall attack them in the flanks at first, keeping up the pressure. However, once you and your girls have annihilated the enemy archers, our cavalry archers can fire at will, killing their spearmen and shot any other foot soldiers down where they stand. The rest will no doubt panic and run scared, leaving us as victors of the day."

"Ladies, I think we got ourselves a splendid battle plan. We will of cause have to perfect it on the training-ground. But I am quite confidant," Heliodora concluded.

"Anything to add to that, Commander Myria?"

"Yes, I want Cleonite to lead the heavy Amazon infantry," Myria said. "I trust her with my life and she has got what it takes to win battles against the odds."

"Who?" The other commanders at the war council asked.

"That would be Lieutenant Cleonite, who has served under my command for three years now," Sonyanua said. "However, Cleonite has already once refused to serve as captain. She has very little ambition and she is not worth the effort, she will retire soon."

"I'll be the judge of that!" Myria said firmly. "An Amazon is only as good as her last battle. I will talk to her, we go back a long way and she will not let an old friend down, yet alone let down the Motherland in her hour of need."

"But there are several other captains who are qualified to do the job," Sonyanua pointed out.

"Dear ladies. I am new to the eastern front," Myria parried. "Therefore, I need reliable people around me, who I can fully trust in order for this delicate plan to work."

"Still, you can't just gather your old friends around you," said Drakonis. "This is warfare and not a social gathering. Next you'll demand that your spouse joins our ranks on order to comfort you during nights on the war path."

As intended, Drakonis' taunting words about Lucius provoked Myria and she lost her temper.

"Will you stupid bitches ever stop talking about my spouse?" Myria screamed at her top of her lungs. "I'm trying to make battle-plans here, but at every turn I make, I get my spouse thrown in my face.

"And why all the fuzz?" Myria asked while trying to get a hold on herself and lowered her voice to a normal level. "He's just an ordinary male. I didn't marry a leper, if you must know."

"Well, of course, my dear commander, there is absolutely no need to get at each other's throats," Heliodora stepped in and ended the war counsel spat. "After all, we are all Amazons here. And Captain Drakonis should know better that drag the personal life of a fellow sister in arms into this."

"Queen Hentiope herself assigned Commander Myria up for this mission, regardless of her marital status, so you ladies owe her and her suggestions some respect! Do I make myself clear?"

"Aye-aye, Commander," Sonyanua and the rest of the Amazon commanding officers said.

The hour was late and Heliodora called the meeting adjourned. The Amazons went to their quarters to get some rest, drink wine and gossip about Myria's plan for the upcoming battle, which they found both fool-hearted and reckless. However, Heliodora asked Myria to stay behind for a private talk.

"A word please, Commander Myria!" Heliodora called to her on the way out.

The two of them sat down at the table and enjoyed a cup of wine mixed with fresh cold water.

"You must go and prepare the attack in full detail on the training ground. Make sure that it will actually work on the battlefield, before you even think of going into action."

"And do try to behave yourself, keep a civil tone and don't lose your temper again in the company of fellow Amazon commanders and officers."

"This was your first day at the Amazon war counsel as a commanding officer. You have only been temporary admitted into our ranks for this campaign. The other commanders are winding you up for sport and trust me, they will keep throwing your spouse in your face for ever and ever, but you just have to learn to let it go by during your trial period until you proven your valour in the battlefield."

"And be warned; some of the other commanders feel that you don't belong here. They say that you have grown soft by living in wild extravagant luxury up north, while being eagerly serviced sexually by your loving spouse. They say that you are far too lenient with him, because that you have fallen under his spell. We both know that this isn't true, but I'm only one woman. And if this plan of yours fails, they will come down hard on you, I will not be able to help you. You will never get this chance again, but will have live in shame up north for the rest of your natural life."

Although Myria personal friends had stayed loyal and honoured their friendship during her exile up north in the Gargarean nation, Myria had become an outsider in the ranks of her fellow the Amazon commanders. Some resented and mistrusted her, because she still lived with her spouse. Others simply considered her a rusty old has-been, who was over the hill by now and more suited for retirement than fighting.

"But I never wanted to be transferred to the north, nor did I ever ask to be married to my spouse," Myria parried. "I had to take this course in life because I was under orders from the Queen. I am *-* and I have always been, loyal to the Queen and the Motherland alike. I have no greater wish than to serve the Amazon cause in the battlefield. I am a soldier and I go where the Queen tells me to go. How can they hold the past against me now?"

"And what are they, but turds spat out of the Mother Nature's ass?" Myria spat.

"If women are fighting against women these days, then truly, the cause of the Amazons is lost and the male domination will prevail - regardless of who wins the upcoming battle," Myria lamented.

"Well spoken, Commander," Heliodora complimented her. "But you did well getting your old and trusted friend Cleonite to serve at your side. Brave and reliable women are needed for upcoming battle. Is there anyone else that you would recommend for promotion to fight by your side?"

"Well, for starters, there is my spouse, Lucianus …" Myria began and looked Heliodora straight in the eye.

Heliodora immediately froze, when Myria spoke the name of her spouse. But then she finally realized that Myria was just being funny and Heliodora laughed out loud.

"What a joker you have become, Commander Myria! I don't know what happened to you up north, but you seem to be in very good mood these days. I have not seen this kind of high spirits in a very long time."

"Well, you try living in exile for three odd years with nothing to do than waiting in quiet desperation," Myria explained. "You would feel happy as me when finally being called back to my rightful place in the Amazon wars. Now that I have been promoted to the Amazon war counsel, I intend to keep this position, come what may!"

"I knew you would, Commander, and that's why I recommended to Queen Hentiope that you should be promoted to this position and recalled from exile. I told the Queen that your fighting skills are wasted up north and that the Motherland needs every able woman in these dark times with our borders under heavy pressure."

"Still, you better prove that my trust in you was not misplaced, or else it could have dire consequences for the both of us," Heliodora lectured Myria and then dismissed her.

So, after all it was Commander Heliodora who had pleaded to Queen on behalf of Myria before Lucius had a chance to do it himself. Myria had reckoned that Heliodora could be most useful in order to secure her return to Amazon warfare. Sadly, Lucius had failed to fully satisfy Heliodora sexually when she came to visit. See chapter VIII: Myria's birthday party, Part I. Therefore, Myria had long ago given up on any help from her.

However, Commander Heliodora was not driven by any sexual lusts when making military decisions. She clearly saw the potential in Myria and noticed her burning ambition to serve the Motherland on the battlefield. Motherhood and child-caring was not was not the forte of Myria. And besides, having Myria as her loyal friend and ally in the Amazon council could very well prove to be a great advantage for Commander Heliodora. After all, Myria had kept her mouth shut about Heliodora's secret craving for male dominated sex.

Myria was now in debt to Heliodora because she owned her new position at the Amazon war council to her. Myria would properly have to do Heliodora's bidding in the future, but this seems a small price to pay in the eyes of Myria.

After her heart-to-heart with Commander Heliodora, Myria wasted no time, but immediately sought out Cleonite in order to involve her old friend in the upcoming battle-plans. She couldn't find her at first, but then Myria suddenly remembered her old friend's old habit of drinking wine when she had nothing to do better to do.

She finally found Cleonite in a tent where they served wine for the thirsty officers. She had positioned herself with a cup and a jug of wine. However, when she put the cup of wine, which was filled to the brink, Myria restrained her hand.

"Halt, old friend. Stop soaking up wine like a sponge, we got work to do."

"But what about the wine that I just bought?" Cleonite politely objected.

"Donate it to your fellow sisters in arms. You are a Captain now."

"Me, Captain?"

"Yes, I want you to fight this war by my side. I am counting on you!"

"But, I ehh …"

"Are you gonna let down an old friend in need, not to mention the Motherland, which are in peril?" Myria barked at her old friend.

"Certainly not! I am thine to command," Cleonite promptly said.

Then she got up and saluted her old friend - and commanding officer. Myria in turn ordered her to go to bed and get enough sleep. Then meet Myria at the training ground early the next morning, where they would begin preparing the tactics for upcoming battle against the Colchian army.

To be continued....

The chapter on Myria's new war merits will continue in the 3rd part, where she and Cleonite perfects the Amazon battle plan on the training ground. Later, the Amazon army - led by Myria, attacks the Colchian army in the open battlefield.

The storyline is set for many more chapters, however comments, suggestions or story ideas are welcome, just email the author at jallanj@yahoo.dk

The whole story on the Amazons - So far: