Chapter Text
“Why does Xena want you so much?” Ephiny asked the roof of the tent, apropos of nothing. “Are your little stories really that powerful?”
They had been sharing a tent from one new moon to another, now. No more attacks had happened. Ephiny had become used to the new state of affairs, even as Gabrielle’s arms had hardened with muscle from her new training. She worked hard, and yet always had a smile for Ephiny and a hug of thanks for Ephiny, and endless energy to play with Xenan. And to talk.
Ephiny didn’t know how she had ever dealt with silence. She had used to like it. It seemed such a lonely thing, these days.
“ I don’t know.” There was something odd in Gabrielle’s voice. Ephiny rolled over to face her. Xena protested in his sleep and kicked her, with one painful hoof.
“Ouch! Gabrielle, if you know something, you must tell me. The evil of the Conquereor—“
“She’s not evil. Not deep inside.” Gabrielle’s voice was steady. “She looked into my eyes, Ephiny. I know.”
“And then she had you crucified!”
“She was scared.”
“How can you say that? The crosses line the road wherever she goes—“
“She was crucified herself. In Rome. Her legs smashed, like mine.”
“And now she visits it on everyone who gets in her way! Gabrielle—sweet, stupid, Gabrielle, other Amazons have seen good in her. They befriended her, taught her, wanted to take her as a sister. She destroyed them!”
“I can’t help it. And I can’t explain. It was like—like I recognised her. I always knew I had a destiny, Ephiny. When I looked in her eyes, I knew my destiny was to save her.”
“You will destroy us all because you fell in love at first sight with a murderer?”
“It’s not like that! Ephiny…”
Ephiny rolled over and clutched Xenan’s sleeping form to herself. He wriggled a little in protest, and fell back to sleep. She buried her face in his hair, aching with betrayal and—well, she might as well admit it to herself. Jealousy.
“Ephiny, please.”
Ephiny ignored her, and eventually Gabrielle’s breath steadied into sleep.
“It’s not her fault, you know.”
The girl perched on the end of the bedroom examined her perfect fingernails. Golden hair spoiled over her shoulders, shell-pink robes covering little of her voluptuous body, even for an Amazon, and somehow Ephiny saw the colours clearly even in the darkness.
“It’s not my fault, either. I mean, I admit I thought it would be funny to give Xena a bit of the one-two pow. Thought it might teach her a lesson if she fell head over heels for one of her victims. How I was I to know she’d crucify her anyway? Chick’s got issues.” She stretched like a cat. “Oh, don’t look so disappointed. Thought it would be my sister who would appear to you, did she? Sorry, girl, she’s busy.” The goddess got up and looked down into Gabrielle’s sleeping face “Why does Gabby dislike the gods so much? I didn’t do anything to her.”
“You made her fall in love with a mass murderer!”
“Oh, that was nothing to do with me. Go yell at the Fates about it. You, on the other hand…”
“Do you think this is funny, playing with our lives like this?”
The goddess shrugged. “Gotcha. Besides, big bro’s been forgetting alllll about keeping the balance between love and war. Dude can’t have his precious little Xena all to himself. Oh, don’t glare at me like that. I have no intention of breaking up your little family. But when the time comes, you might have to share a bit. You’re a big girl, you can do it.” She wriggled her fingers. “Ta-ta.”
The next thing Ephiny knew, the dawn watch was being called, and the dream still hung heavy over her.
“Ephiny?” Gabrielle’s voice trembled.
Ephiny looked at her. Mussed up hair, sleep at the corner of her eyes and clinging to one eyelash. She rolled over and dropped a kiss on Gabrielle’s cheek before going for water.
It was the first time she had ever kissed Gabrielle. Her cheek had been smooth, and soft. Ephiny’s lips burned, quite without logical reason.
* * *
Ephiny finished her watch and went to sit with Gabrielle. She wasn’t telling stories this time, but peeling onions with a sharp knife. She gave Ephiny a lop-sided smile.
“Thought I’d help out, I used to be quite a decent cook. I would have made some farmer a good wife. It’s not what I wanted, though.”
“What did you want?”
“To see the world. Tell stories. Get into trouble. Help people.”
“You have the heart of an Amazon,” Ephiny said, remembering.
“Perhaps I would have been better off staying at home and getting married.” There were tears in Gabrielle’s sweet eyes. “I don’t really mean that. Or maybe I do. I see you with Xenan, and I will never have that!”
“There’s no reason. Your legs will not walk again, but you’re not hurt in your childbearing parts.”
“Who would want me now? I can’t run a household or farm. I can barely even cook!”
“You deserve someone who wants you, not for the work you can do, but for your heart! For your stories, and your smile, and the way you laugh, and the adorably annoying way you never, ever shut up!“
Ephiny realised that, actually, Gabrielle wasn’t talking now. She was raising a trembling hand, smoking it through Ephiny’s golden curls. A hand smelling of raw onions. Ephiny’s hair was gong to stink.
Ephiny gently took the knife from Gabriells’ other hand, and laid it down. Then she leaned in and kissed her.
“Do you want me, then?” Gabrielle whispered against her lips.
“Damn right. No one is breaking up our family,” Ephiny said, realising as she did it that she meant Xenan as well. She wasn’t giving up either of them. Not one person she loved.
She could learn to share.
“I love you,” Gabrielle said, seriously, her eyes still shining with tears.
“I love you too, you idiot chatterbox.” Ephiny gathered her up, careful of her legs, and carried her gently to the tent.
“I can’t stay with the Amazons forever. There’s things I have to do.”
“I know.”
“You’ll come with me?” Gabrielle’s voice was fragile, vulnerable.
“Where to?”
“Chi’in, where Xena found her honour guard. I’ve heard stories of a woman there that Xena loved, Lao Ma…”
“I’ll follow you to the ends of the earth, and help you do whatever you need to, but I won’t ever give you up.” She laid Gabrielle down on the bedroll, and lay beside her, propped on one elbow, looking down into her face, letting her hand travel up from the girl’s stomach to cup the underside of one small breast.
Gabrielle shivered. “Please don’t.”
“I’m sorry, I thought you wanted—“
“Oh, I don’t mean stop that. I mean—please don’t give me up. Ever. I need you. And Xenan. I never thought I’d find a family among the Amazons, but I love you, Ephiny.”
Gabrielle’s kiss was fierce and sweet, and her hands tangled in Ephiny’s hair, and somewhere in her mouth and her hands, Ephiny lost herself.
She thought she heard a giggle, tinkling like glass, from the corner, but she ignored it. The heart of an Amazon was a fierce and loving thing, and even Aphrodite couldn’t truly govern where it was given.
* * *
It was some months after when Gabrielle, her legs carefully splinted, was lifted in Ephiny’s hands and placed on the horse. Ephiny swung up on her own steed, behind her, and tried to ignore her own impulse to cry.
Gabrielle, of course, noticed. Her hand stole onto Ephiny’s thigh.
“Our son will be safe with the centaurs. And we will return when we’ve learned what we need to. I promise.”
“I know.”
“I love you, Ephiny.”
“I love you, too. Now stop chattering and let’s go!”
They kicked their horses into a walk, and rode off. To the East, to Xena the Conqueror’s past. To their future. Ephiny hardly cared what it meant, how the love between them tied into the greater story of Xena. She had never cared so much for greater fates, after all. As long as Gabrielle was by her side, well, her life would never be dull. Or lonely.
Or quiet.
“I sing of an Amazon with golden curls, mother of a centaur prince, wife of a bard—“
“Oh, shut up.” But Ephiny was grinning as the sunshine fell on her face, and on Gabrielle’s red-gold hair.