Hell Hath No Fury - Book One

Revelations

Theo climbed over the side of the ship and dropped down into the awaiting boat. Morgana, Tuni, and Ava were all in her boat. Ava's expression was one that Theo knew all too well, she also knew the accompanying feelings. Ava was battling between nerves and excitement and her stomach was most likely flipping around. She was spinning her dagger in her hand and tapping her foot against the wooden boat.

"Red, you'll be okay," Morgana reassured her, "If anything goes sideways just remember what I taught you."

Ava pointed to different places on her body, "Side of the neck, base of the neck, liver, armpit."

"Exactly, you're a natural killer," Morgana said.

Theo laughed at that, "Let's try and avoid having to kill someone for as long as possible."

"It's not at the top of my list of things to do, don't worry," Ava said in response and put her dagger away.

The rest of the boat ride was spent in silence interrupted with short attempts at small talk by Tuni. No one was in the mood to talk though; Ava was too nervous, Theo was too focused, and Morgana's head seemed to be in the clouds. To Theo, it felt as if they were never going to get off but eventually their boat touched the sand. She grabbed the edge of the boat and hopped off into the knee-deep water. She touched the ground and took off running towards the cover of the trees. All of them, Ava and Tuni included, followed suit trying to get hidden as quickly as they could. The boats were starting to be rowed back as the vanguard slipped into the jungle.

The vanguard held a total of 25 women, 2 of which were not fighting. Morgana led the line as they trekked their way through the dense trees and vines. They were as quiet as they could be, cautiously stopping at any noise they heard. There were a lot of them and the risk of being caught was high if that was the case they had all been instructed to flee in a certain direction with a certain group. However, the need never arose. They carefully climbed through the difficult terrain for hours, taking short breaks to hydrate and rest.

Morgana held her hand up and everyone stopped. She turned to Theo and whispered, "I think this is as far as we should go. Want to go, scout, the camp?"

Theo agreed and Morgana signaled to Iona to let her know they would be leaving. Once the group was informed Theo and Morgana snuck through the brush. They walked for about ten minutes before finding the first signs of a camp. Theo spotted it first and quickly pulled Morgana behind a large tree. When they were sure no one was around they crept out from behind the tree and advanced further, trying to get a better look at what they were up against.

The military had cleared a large area in the jungle and set up tents and small wood cabins but besides that, not many strategic advantages were revealed to them. Theo scanned the camp and counted only around 10 men out and about between the tents, not an accurate reading. The visible soldiers were armed with swords but had no form of armor. Men were drinking despite there still being light outside and those she could see looked relaxed. They did not seem to be expecting an attack. There was no way to gauge how big the camp was or how best to attack them while keeping the element of surprise. Morgana shared Theo's concerns about that.

"We can't see shit. We'd be going in blind," Morgana whispered.

"We can't go further. We're just going to have to hope there's not more than 30 men," Theo replied.

"Our girls can take at least 40 men," Morgana bragged and Theo ignored her, opting to start walking back instead.

Once they had walked far enough that they could speak more clearly, Theo shared her thoughts.

"They aren't expecting us. You saw how they were dressed? Not a piece of armor in sight. We don't have an accurate map of the camp but we have night time and surprise on our side."