Disclaimers: See Chapter I

This page also contains references to a sex between womyn. If you are under 18 or this offends you, go elsewhere. You've been warned.

Morning arrived. The damp jail cell was making Jessie sick to her stomach, and the latrine already stunk from previous rebellions by her stomach.

She heard the jailer's keys jingle, and a short, stout guard stood before the jail cell, took out the keys and unlocked her cell. "You're free to go."

She wandered into town, and found Alex eating outside of one of the cafes.

"Out already?"

Jessie shrugged, taking a seat across from her, her head down. "Having parents in The Council helps sometimes," she sighed.

"You don't sound too happy."

"I just don't know what I'm going to do about Cady. This isn't the first time she's cheated on me. This is just the first time I've actually caught her in the act."

"That cadet you beat the crap out of barely survived."

"I'm so glad you stopped me Alex, I really didn't mean to lose control like that." Tired eyes rose to met Alex's. "I always thought there was more dignity in me than that. Looks like I'm dead wrong."

Alex scooted her chair over and put an arm around her sad friend. "In some cases, divorce is a good option."

"Well, legally, yeah, but the great Goddess Aphrodite really hates it when womyn get divorced."

"Jessie, you're going to have to face it sooner or later. Cady isn't going to return and be faithful."

"Don't say that!" Jessie cried, her voice cracking as she started to lose her composure.

"You're going to have to face the music, Jessie," Alex said. "And once she's in the cadets, there's no way she's coming back."

"I wish this never had to happen."

"She's eighteen, Jessie. It's time for her tour of duty."

Jessie just shook her head, her eyes downcast. "You do have a point Alex," she mumbled, then looking up and adding, "After all, I think it was the uniform she fell for, not me. She just wasn't going to tell me that."

"And she went ahead and married you still. That, my friend, is the grave offense before great Aphrodite's eyes, and would not implicate you. Better you divorce your faithless wife now than have it be five years down the road, you two have children, and she's still cheating on you."

"I still would rather talk to great Aphrodite before I took that course of action."

"I say that's a very good idea."

A year previous. Growing Moon, 469 ACE.

She had just come home after graduating the Cadets. Her friend in naval training had been in Somerfield for a week, and wanted to go to a pub and party. This friend, Maida, mentioned that they had just opened a new pub that catered to the younger Amazon population.

Amid heavy drumming and primal yelling too tuneless to be called screaming, they entered the pub, where sweaty young Amazon bodies danced to the pulsating beat.

"Oh brother," Jessie said, grinning. "This is my kind of place," she laughed.

"What? Haven't had any sweet things to lay?"

"We don't leave base, unlike you Navy brats," Jessie countered.

Maida laughed. "Yeah right! We don't leave base either!" Then a devilish grin crossed her face. "What do you think a group of horny teenagers do when there's no outside source to relieve the frustration?"

Jessie covered her face with her hands. "I get it," she said, shaking her head. "At least your squadron gets along enough to do that!"

"Oh, your poor girl," Maida said. "You are long overdue."

A small, delicate, and obviously drunk brunette approached her. "Want to dance?"

Jessie grinned. The girl was at least a foot smaller than her, light and delicate. She felt her large hand be gently embraced by the girl's two small hands, and be led to the dance floor.

"What's your name?" the drunk girl asked.

"Jessie. And yours?"

"Cady."

She could smell victory. The girl couldn't get her eyes off the tall, newly graduated Blackguard; oh, it would be so easy to relieve a year's worth of tension right now. As soon as they left the pub.

"Say, my parents aren't home. Want to come over and, you know--"

"Yes," Jessie said, wrapping her large arm around the delicate girl and ducking out of the back entrance.

"Won't be seeing them for a while!" Maida laughed to herself.

A week later.

They had agreed to meet in the little forest behind the Hunter estate. And as she had said, she was there, waiting. "Hello," she said softly, her eyes hungry.

Jessie didn't even bother to say anything, as she took the small girl in her arms and began to hungrily kiss her, a bit on the rough side as Cady liked it.

She probed further in the brunettes mouth, earning a sensual moan that made Jessie weak in the knees. She clutched the brunette's waist and pulled her down as she sat in the warm spring grass, and continued their explorations. Cady loosened her tunic and put her warm hands inside, stroking the smooth, muscular back, causing her new lover to shiver.

"Jessie," her mother called from around the corner. She broke off the kiss, her hands beginning to wander towards the edges of Cady's tunic, turned around and saw that Alex had arrived.

Shit, I forgot that Alex was coming! Jessie chastised herself, as anxious lips sought out her lips once more.

Alex turned around and ran out of sight. "ALEX!" Jessie called out, interrupting the caress and chasing after her friend.

"What the hell? It was supposed to be you and me," Cady grumbled, as she left.

She saw Alex sitting by the stream, throwing stones into the water and screaming. "NO!!!!!!!!!" she yelled at the top of her lungs, crying. Tears furiously streaked down her face, agony etched upon her features.

She rested her head on her knees, shaking. Wiping her eyes, she stared across the brook, her eyes vacant and red. She picked up another stone and hurled it across the stream at full force, flying wildly and whizzing past Jessie's head.

"Yow, watch out! You almost beaned me!" Jessie emerged through the woods, her tunic still undone a wee bit. "What's wrong?"

"FUCK OFF!" Alex screamed, before running off into the woods.

Jessie sat by the side of the brook, confused. "What the hell is going on?"

"Yes, I'm very much in love with her, Alex," Jessie responded. It was too dark in the room so see how Alex was reacting to the news; after seeing her react so badly initially she wondered if Alex had fallen for her.

She put a hand out to give Alex a reassuring pat, and felt the tension in her shoulder. "Don't touch me," Alex growled.

"Sorry."

"I'm sorry I snapped at you."

"What's wrong Alex?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Come on, I'm your best friend."

"I'm not talking about it."

"It's about me and Cady, isn't it?"

"I said I am not talking about it!"

"Okay. But any time you need to talk, your best friend's here to listen, okay?"

She barely heard the words, "I'm not your best friend; that girl is."

Winter Solstice, end of 469 ACE.

It had been ten moons since they had seen each other. Since Alex didn't have much family to go home to for Solstice, save her over-critical grandmother Maxwell, the Hunters had invited Alex over to spend Solstice with them.

Cady wasn't too happy. "You're supposed to spend Solstice with me! For crying out loud, we're married!"

"I am!" Jessie defended herself.

"I don't want to eat with your parents, they hate me."

"They don't hate you, Cady," Jessie replied.

"Bullshit."

"Come on, just one night? Please?" Jessie pleaded.

"And then they had to invite Alex along too."

"Alex is my old friend from the cadets. What's wrong with her?"

"I don't like the way she looks at you."

"She knows I'm taken, why are you so worried?"

"If you loved me, we'd spend Solstice together, alone."

"Sweety, I love you," Jessie said, hugging her.

"You and your charms, oh how can I resist them?" Cady asked before leaning in and shoving her tongue into Jessie's mouth.

They were at the pub again, where they had first met nine months prior. Jessie kept a protective arm around her charge, or so Alex noticed, as she sat there at the bar, watching her friend dance.

The barkeeper rested her elbows on the counter. "New here?"

"Visiting a friend."

"Jessie?"

"Yeah."

"You know her girlfriend, Cady?"

"I know who she is..."

"Yeah, they say she's two timing on Jessie."

"That little b--"

"That's just town rumor though."

"If she hurts Jessie..." she said, leaving the thought unfinished.

Growing Moon, 470 ACE. Back to the present.

"How'd the talk go?" Alex asked, as her tired, weary companion walked in the door. She had gone to the local temple in town to talk to the great Goddess Aphrodite.

Jessie sat next to her on the couch and rested her head on her friend's shoulder. "I really don't want to do this but she left me with no choice," she sighed quietly, her composure breaking.

Alex wrapped an awkward arm around her saddened companion. "I was thinking while you were gone."

"Yeah?"

"I remember the night you took us all out to the pub."

"And your point.."

"Well, you and Cady were out dancing when the barkeep came up and said there had been rumors flying that Cady was cheating on you. I'd forgotten about it until now."

"Yeah. I don't doubt it." A single tear ran down her face. "I really don't want to do this, Alex, but yet another part of my heart says she'll continue to screw me over if I stay!"

"Oh Jessie," Alex softly whispered in her ear, as her friend welcomed the embrace. "I don't want to see you getting hurt needlessly."

Three days later. The day before Cadets starts.

The small brunette stormed up to Jessie. "What's this shit?" she yelled, waving a piece of paper in front of her face.

Jessie took a deep breath and regained her emotionless composure. "Divorce papers."

"Aphrodite will see to it you burn in hell, you fucking bitch!"

"Call me all you want. I wasn't the one cheating with that cadet."

"Fuck you, you monster! You're the one who tried to kill her!"

Jessie dug her hands in her pockets further. "I don't want any of this relationship anymore."

"Over a simple fling?"

"It's not the first time you cheated on me, and it won't be the last time. Be free, little one." She clenched her fists in her pockets as she turned around to leave.

Alex stood there, watching Cady's furious face transform into a crestfallen look of sadness when she realized Jessie was serious. Sad brown eyes looked pitifully at Alex, a simple plea that she get Jessie's attention so she could try to reconcile the broken relationship, but Alex simply shrugged and turned around to join Jessie in walking back to town.

"Hopefully she'll get the hint and agree peacefully to the divorce," Jessie sighed.

Next day.

Terra and Rickie were just finished eating mess when a first year cadet was wandering the grounds, out of place from the training field.

Being a second year cadet and therefore higher in rank, Rickie called out, "Grunt! What are you doing off the training field?"

Terra recognized it as the little woman whose wife beat the daylights out of her not too long ago. "Cady, wouldn't that be?"

"Cadet Hunter, ma'am!"

"And why are you not on the field?" demanded Rickie.

"Summons, ma'am!"

"And where would that be?" Rickie asked.

"Temple, ma'am!"

"What for?" demanded Terra.

The cadet wavered, but bit her lip and answered, less loudly, "Divorce, ma'am, divorce."

Jessie packed up her stuff, Alex nearby packing up her stuff. "I'm so glad she just said 'yes' and got the damn thing over with," Jessie sighed.

"Yeah. Now you can move on."

"And she can freely fuck any bitch without me being involved," Jessie added.

"Where off to now?" Alex asked, cinching the rope that held the bedding bundle to her pack.

"Fort Langley."

"Funny, I got the same commission."

"Well, let's go."