Titans of Chaos

During that minute, I saw two squirrels, a brace of rabbits, and several flocks of birds streamingout of the trees to my left. A fox ran alongside the squirrels without molesting them. The rabbitpaused to thrum his hind paw against the dirt, giving off the drumming warning-signal of his kind.

All the birds were shrieking with alarm.

I had heard about animals acting this way when they ran from forest fires. The noise and smokeand commotion coming through the wood was louder than any forest fire, and toppling treesgroaned and creaked, wood snapped with reports like rifle shots, scores of trees smote the groundlike thunder, and the cloud of dust approaching rose higher and ever higher.

Leucosia swam past, circles within circles of eyes blazing "beneath" us in the blue direction, onlysix inches or so below the world-plane, but scores of yards above the treetops and to our left.

Time to saddle up. I let Antiope keep the sidearm, which had bullets similar to the four types ofshells carried in the rifle. My rifle. I gave her two extra magazines of the anti-psychic shells.

I figured that if those were the shells designed to work against Colin, they would work against themaenads.

It should have been the most terrible turning point in my life, the darkest moral quandary.

Instead, it was thoughtless, almost automatic. You see, it never occurred to me that the maenadswere real people, that they had souls or preferences or families or anything. I just thought theywere crazed monsters. Without a qualm, I ordered my two Amazon-puppets to advance throughthe little stand of trees separating the deer-path from the clearing where the line of electricaltowers stood, and open fire upon the maenads when they crossed the open grass. Number twocyclopes-horse I sent with them, so he could start fires, create explosives, turn the air intoneurotoxins, do nasty things.

I did not tell the two Amazons to fight until they died, but I did not program them with any ordersto retreat either. So I guess I sent them to their deaths. One of them was stark naked, and armedonly with a pistol.

I did not feel bad about it at the time. Despite all of Quentin's warnings, despite that I had beenbrought up as a civilized and thoughtful girl... I just sent them off.

I rode in the other direction.

The three-eyed steeds were fast.