Chapter 1

It was during the full moon of the summer harvest. Ten chosen women gathered in the field of creation. Male and female warriors over sixteen summers stood guard. Spears and bows in hand. The elders, men, women, and children chanted softly, beseeching the gods to grant a successful getting. This ritual was the future of the tribe. Today the tribe’s warriors would be conceived.

A good warrior must have the wisdom of the mature and the strength and fearlessness of the young. All the women chosen to birth a warrior were the wisest, over thirty summers old and proven fertile.

The bonfire was lit. The bare-breasted woman sang as they removed their colorful sarong before joining hands and dancing around the roaring flames. Their straight waist-length blue-black hair flew unrestrained about their heads. Sweat gathered on their light brown skin, reflecting the light from the flames.

The War Chiefs led Thirty boys between fourteen and fifteen summers old onto the field. The tribe’s most fearless. Strongest, most cunning and most talented young boys. Ten fearless warriors in training. Ten cunning young hunters. Ten talented apprentice artisans. The ten mature women chosen for their wisdom and fertility would couple with a warrior, a hunter, and an artisan. It was believed that the blending of the tribe’s finest produced the best warriors.

The boys dropped their loincloths and prepared their cocks. They stamped their feet as they stroked themselves. The women stopped their dancing and fell to their knees. They lifted their arms and wailed at the moon, asking for the blessing of a child.

To birth, a warrior was an honor not afforded to every woman in the tribe. The chosen women all had husbands and other children. Their husbands would walk with pride by the side of the woman that conceived on this night.

They would raise the child until they were six summers. Then the child would be taken away to train for ten summers and ten rainy seasons. Those that survived the training were the most feared warriors on this side of the impassable mountain range.

Mary Harrington filmed the ceremony that no outsider had ever seen.

Chapter 2

“Mayday, Mayday. This is Mary Harrington. I’m going down. Engine failure. Mayday. Mayday.”

Hunters of the Noya tribe found me lying dazed and bleeding outside my severely damaged plane. My waist-length blond braid fascinated them, so they did not kill me. They bound my wounds and took me to their healer. She applied a poultice to my cuts and set my fractured wrist and leg. They made a very tasty medicinal tea for me to drink. Over the month it took me to heal, I learned enough words to communicate when I was hungry, thirsty or needed to pee.

Over the next two months, my vocabulary increased to the point that I was able to hold a simple conversation. I understood more than I could communicate. Inflection, body language, gestures, facial expressions and grouping of words that I only partially understood gave me the clues to work out the meaning of new words.

Their jokes and sense of humor completely baffled me. My complete lack of understanding of their jokes seemed to amuse them. My need for privacy when taking care of bodily functions and bathing, dressing or undressing amused them.

The women tittered as they tended their gardens and watched me jog around the village in circles to get my strength back. A lot about me amused them. Sometimes I thought that was the only reason they kept me around and didn’t sell me to another tribe for seashells.

Once my language skills were sufficient, I was able to convince the elders to let me return to my wrecked plane to try and salvage what I could of my possessions. One of the hunters that found me acted as a guide along with two warriors for protection. I was able to salvage my cell phone and the solar-powered charger, a first aid kit, a toothbrush, clothes, boots, a logbook, pens and a bottle of red wine. Of course, there wasn’t any cell service, but the phone would serve me well as a recorder of my experiences.

After recovering sufficiently from my wounds, I was taken to the residence of unmated women and shown a sleeping pallet and trunk that was to be mine. The young girls and women warmly welcomed me, and my foreign idiosyncrasies were tolerated. It amused them.

The closest I could describe my sleeping quarters would be a lodge. It was a fourteen-foot by fifty-foot stone and log building with a thatched roof. A fire pit in the center for warmth and cooking. Finely crafted benches and table. Trunks and cabinets for storage. I shared it with ten other unmated women in their late teens, twenties, and thirties. There were several of these lodges. Women outnumbered the available men for mates. However, as I soon found out, they did not lack companionship at night when they were in the mood.

I was fascinated by the sophistication of their building skills. It reminded me of the Aztecs and Mayan without the grandiose structures to the gods. All the buildings had a purpose, workshops, dwellings, meeting hall, and storage rooms. There was even a blacksmith shop where they worked iron.

It was dark and only my second night sleeping in the lodge. I was on my pallet trying to sleep when I realized a couple of the girls had company and were having sex. I turned my back to the sounds and tried to ignore them. At first, their lack of modesty was unnerving, and the girls thought nothing of getting naked when washing after a day of working in the fields or the craft shops weaving and throwing pottery. They seemed to be naked more often than dressed in the lodge. I found it odd because men often came in to talk to the women.

A woman named Cerga befriended me. She told me she was thirty-eight summers old. She appeared to be the den mother for the others in the lodge. She took me under her wing and explained the strange behavior of her people. She explained that the girls often went naked in the lodge to lure a mate. The men that visited were looking for a mate and would visit the lodge to talk to the girls and view their charms.

She explained to me about their sexual mores. Men over eighteen summers were encouraged to quickly choose a mate if they did not already have a betrothed. This was done by not allowing them to have sex after their seventeenth summer with unmated women. If they were slow to choose a mate, their only sexual outlet was the female warriors or mated friends that might allow them to join them on special occasions.

Few female warriors had sex with anyone but the male warriors. Warriors were not allowed to take a permanent mate and have a family. The competition for the female warrior’s affection must be fierce. Apparently, the system worked. There were very few unmated men over twenty summers old.

I asked about the young girls, and Cerga told me they stayed with their family for eighteen summers and then moved to the lodge if they had not found a mate.

She told me because of our advanced age and my odd coloring; it was unlikely that we would be chosen as a mate. I breathed a sigh of relief at finding that out.

Then she told me the strangest thing, “Since mated men and men over eighteen summers were not allowed to have sex with the unmated women, that only left the boys entering puberty to seventeen summers available for sex with the unmated women. As an unmated woman, I was free to choose any willing boy I fancied.”

I held my thoughts about having sex with teenagers to myself. I was in no position to press my values upon them. I did tell Cerga I found it odd that the unmated females did the choosing. I explained that where I came from, it was the male that usually did the pursuing of a woman.

She scoffed as if I had made a joke, “Married men are free to choose when to have sex with their mate. But it would be foolish to let young boys choose when to have sex with us unmated. They are always ready for sex from the moment they wake up until they go to sleep. I, on the other hand, am not ready but once or twice a cycle. (Eight days by our calendar.)”

It only hit me at that moment that this thirty-eight-year-old woman and the other women in the lodge are having sex with adolescents once or twice a week.

Then she said something that again shocked me, “You have your strength back. You should choose one of the boys soon. You have been too long without a coupling.”

I thought I had better put that foolishness to rest, “I am too old to be with child and do not want a child.”

Cerga put that excuse to rest pretty quickly, “The tea you drink will prevent a getting.” Then she laughed. “Can you imagine a man choosing an unmated already with child?” Then she laughed again.

I do seem to keep amusing them.

She explained that the tea prevented pregnancy for forty-eight hours, and it was best to drink a cup every day. All girls from puberty till mated drank it.

Mated women drank the tea after their first child to control the timing of future births. They would also drink it before having sex with other men besides their mate. According to Cerga, it was not uncommon for a group of woman friends to drink the tea and swap their mates for a night. Occasionally an unmarried male or female friend of the family would be invited by the married couple for a night of fun. She said it made for a happier and longer-lasting mating.

In the warrior class, the men outnumbered the women by almost thirty percent. Cerga could only remember once that the Gods had not blessed them with more male warrior births than female.”

Male and female warriors were not allowed to take a mate and become a family unit. The female warriors drank the tea and were free to take any warrior they desired to their bed for sex, but they were not allowed to become pregnant. Even a male warrior in training that had reached puberty was fair game for these Amazons.

Cerga did say, “Some of the female warriors formed a sexual bond with only one male warrior. But the other warrior maidens had many young and mature lovers. Very much fun for warrior girls, as she put it.”

All of this I recorded in my logbook. Along with pictures of their crafts and textiles. Useful plants and what foods they subsisted on.

The more I learned and observed, the more tolerant and accepting of their ways I became. I even started to view it as normal to see a girl in her mid-twenties or older bringing a young boy to her bed for sex. The only privacy awarded them in the lodge was a thin privacy curtain, averted eyes and turned backs of others that expected the same courtesy. If they wanted complete privacy, there was always the jungle. I would always smile when I would see my friend Cerga heading toward the edge of the village, hand in hand with a young lad.

The young boys would leave shortly after having sex and return to their families to brag about being chosen to their proud parents.

Chapter 3

It was a day of great excitement. The Bactorie were coming. The elders dressed in their finery to greet the Bactorie tribal elders. There was feasting. Warriors and villagers from both tribes mingled and greeted each other warmly. Cerga explained that it was one of the few times of the year that many of the villagers had to visit with relatives that had mated with Bactorie.

Of course, I was a curiosity to the Bactorie men and women. They smiled and talked softly to each other behind their hands when around me. Some wanted to touch my hair. My friend Cerga stayed close and kept the overly curious at bay.

The feasting and festivities went on for five days. Unmated men and women from both tribes mingled and flirted. I’m sure a few inter-tribe matings were arranged.

Then as suddenly as they had appeared, they left during the night, which I found curious. Traveling at night through the jungle was very dangerous.

The following day Cerga filled a basket with food and drink and hurried me along. She wanted to make sure she had a good spot to observe the day’s festivities. I followed her, not knowing what was going on. There was excitement throughout the village. Villagers with baskets and kids in tow were heading to the south of the village.

Villagers gathered on a knoll fifty yards back from an open field. A hundred of our male warriors came onto the field and formed a line. Then twenty female archers lined up twenty-five yards behind them. An equal number of male Bactorie lined up on the opposite side of the field. I didn’t observe any female warriors on the Bactorie side.

The remaining Noya and Bactorie warriors and war chiefs stood off to the side of the field to observe and control the battle.

Women tittered, and men laughed as the male warriors taunted each other with insults and lifted their leather armor and loincloth to bare their genitals. Our female warriors gestured in what I assumed were insults to the opposing warrior’s manhood.

Warriors danced forward in mock attacks, then retreated to their lines and turned to bare their asses to the opposition. I admit I found this amusing when the women hooted and whistled when a particularly handsome warrior exposed himself.

The taunts and insults continued for over an hour and seemed to delight the spectators, Bactorie and Noya alike.

Drums started to beat a slow rhythm, and everyone fell silent. Bactorie warriors beat their shields with their spears in rhythm with the drums as they moved toward our line of warriors. Our warriors beat their shields in the same rhythm as the Bactorie as they moved forward. It seemed the fun was over. I could feel the tension in the crowd around me and see the intensity with which the warriors moved.

Blunted arrows from the opposing armies bounced off shields and occasionally hit a warrior too slow to raise his shield. The spears the warriors had were not blunted. Once the opposing forces met, it became very dangerous. If a warrior was wounded, he left the field. No one pursued or continued the attack once blood was drawn.

The number of warriors fighting dwindled as time went on. The wounded were being cared for behind the lines. The turning point in the battle came when five warriors of the Bactorie tribe retreated with wounds. We now had an overwhelming nine-warrior advantage. The war chiefs that observed the battle raised their spears over their heads. The drums stopped. The warriors stopped fighting to clasp hands and hug their opponents in this deadly mock battle.

Unfortunately, there were two casualties. One unlucky Bactorie warrior was too slow in raising his shield or distracted by an opponent and took an arrow through the eye. The other Bactorie succumbed to a chest wound too severe to recover from.

Two women came forward escorted by six Bactorie warriors. Our War Chief tapped two warriors with his spear. They laid aside their shield and spear. They removed their leather tunic and walked toward the opposing party in only their loincloth.

They bowed deeply before removing their loincloths. The warriors escorting the two women started to chant. The Bactorie villagers and warriors joined in the chant. The women removed their clothing and lay in the field. Each warrior knelt between one of the women’s legs and mounted them to have intercourse. Our warriors started to chant louder and stamp their feet in rhythm.

The women around me started to wail. Other onlookers chanted and stomped their feet.

At first, I was angry with them and thought of this as a barbaric act. I asked Cerga, “Why are they raping those women. Are they a trophy, a prize for the men?”

“It is not rape or a prize of war.” Cerga assured me, “Our warriors took the life and spirit of two of their warriors. It is only right that they should return their spirit to their rightful tribe so they may live and fight again.”

A simple logic. Take a life, give a life, another interesting fact for my journal. These people believed in reincarnation.

I helped with the wounded and was binding Herits leg wound. It was a nasty gash along the outside of the thigh from a thrown spear.

I asked Herits about what I had observed, “I noticed none of the female warriors were on the line. They all stayed back with their bows. It looked dangerous the way they shot their arrows at the Bactorie. Sometimes barely missing our warriors.”

“Not as dangerous as having them on the line. They would giggle and laugh when the Bactorie shake their cocks at us to show us what fierce men they are. And they have no cocks to shake back to show them we are fiercer and bigger.”

Then he pointed at his friend Junhar. “If he were back there with a bow, he would be more likely to shoot me in the ass.”

“Yes, I would do that.” Was Junhar’s deadpan reply

I was laughing. I got that this was all a joke.

I also learned from Herits the real reason. He explained that only the women trained with bow, shield, and spear. It was also thought that their hands were steadier and their eyes keener. From what I saw today, I believe it to be true. The other reason was they were the reserves. If the line broke, they would drop their bow, take up their shield and spear, push the opposing forces back, and fill the gap.

The battle was viewed as a great success. Only twenty-seven were wounded on our side, and all would recover. The Bactorie counted two dead and thirty-four wounded.

The Bactorie always returned this time of year to feast and test the warriors. Tributes would be paid to their elders for the warriors killed and wounded to ensure their return next year.

A grand celebration was promised for tonight. The elders of the Bactorie tribe would again feast and talk with our elders. There was dancing, feasting, and music for everyone.

It was just after dark, and the celebration was well underway. I stood sipping the local alcohol mixed with a local fruit juice that I could not identify. I was enjoying the music from the drums and windpipes, watching the dancers, the flirting as couples moved off to the darker corners, then coming back to drink and dance again. Some of the unmated danced topless with the young boys.

A young boy that could not be older than sixteen approached me. He stood and stared at me for a couple of minutes. I smiled to acknowledge his presence. Thankfully he finally spoke. He was making me nervous just staring at me. “You are unmated?” He asked.

“Yes, I am.”

“Even in your land?”

“Yes, I am.” Being divorced counted as far as I was concerned. I had some idea where this conversation was going.

“You can choose me if you want. I do not care that you are pale and not one of us.” He lifted his loincloth and showed me his cock. Like other celebrations and parties, it involved drinking and sex. Unmated women were pairing up with young boys and wandering off, only to return later and tease the unmated men. Even my friend Cerga left with a boy less than half her age. Mated couples Bactorie and Noya were trading partners as they danced. Some wandering off for a time. I was sure a lot of tea had been consumed this day. After all, it was a celebration.