All four argue why it should be them

For several seconds, no one answered.

The silence was not reluctance. Winston realized that almost immediately. Four women who had argued with him, challenged him, threatened him, and spent most of their time together treating uncertainty as something to be attacked directly had finally encountered one none of them quite knew how to approach.

It unsettled them differently. Penthascara had drawn herself almost too straight, as though posture might impose order on the situation before anyone spoke. Aurascyra’s spear had drifted slightly from its usual disciplined angle while her attention moved between the others. Helisparga remained quiet, one thumb passing slowly over the opposite knuckle. Xanthibarqa alone seemed unable to tolerate the waiting for long.

One measured pace carried her out from the others.

There was nothing hurried about it. She simply occupied the ground in front of them and stayed there, axe hanging low at her side, as though moving first had already made the position partly hers.

Her attention settled on Winston. “Then it should be me.”

The words had the certainty of a guard claiming first watch. Whatever uncertainty had brought the others to stillness, Xanthibarqa appeared to have answered hers by advancing directly into it.

She did not surrender the ground after speaking. If anything, her stance settled more firmly. “I stand nearest his person. That is already my place. If one of us is to go first, I see no reason to stand behind the others and wait to be summoned like a petitioner.”

The scrape of a sandal answered her. Penthascara moved only half a pace, but she placed the step with almost ceremonial precision, feet settling squarely beneath her and chin rising as though the dispute might become manageable if everyone would only observe proper procedure.

“No. If this household is to have an order, then this will have one as well. You do not establish precedence simply by stepping forward before anyone else has spoken.”

The accusation finally pulled Xanthibarqa away from Winston. “I did not establish anything.”

Penthascara held the half-step she had claimed. “You stepped forward first.”

“Because the rest of you were standing there.”

“For three breaths.”

That gave Xanthibarqa genuine pause. Her gaze moved briefly over the others, apparently checking the fairness of the charge, before returning to Penthascara. “That seemed sufficient.”

For a moment neither woman was willing to back down. Xanthibarqa held her place as though possession of the ground itself settled the argument, while Penthascara seemed increasingly offended that three breaths might now qualify as legitimate procedure. Winston was starting to see perhaps one of the dangers of being loved by multiple women.

Beside Winston, Hippolyta remained comfortably silent, the faint curve at the corner of her mouth making it obvious that the silence was deliberate. He caught the look. “You’re going to let them do this, aren’t you?”

The smile only deepened. “For the moment.”

That was apparently sanction enough. Across from them, Penthascara straightened another fraction and gathered what remained of her composure around herself. “I claim first place among us. After the queen.” The words became more formal as she went, as though precision might keep the subject safely within the bounds of household law.

The correction came out more stiffly than the original claim. Winston failed to hide the beginning of a smile, and Penthascara caught it immediately. Her chin climbed another fraction; when she spoke again, every word had acquired the clipped precision of someone trying to restore order to herself along with the room.

“You understand what I mean.”

While Winston tried to assure her that he did, though his expression rather spoiled the reassurance.

“Then stop looking amused.”

Sadly the attempt only made her regard him with greater suspicion.

Nearby, Aurascyra’s spear had drifted lower while she listened, its point gradually forgotten as dissatisfaction with both arguments overtook everything else.

“Neither of those is a reason.”

Penthascara turned on her at once. “I gave several.”

“You gave preferences and called them principles. Xanthibarqa wants precedence because she moved first. You want it because you dislike anyone else deciding the order. Neither tells us why either of you should have it.”

Penthascara’s eyes narrowed. “And you have a better reason?” her challenge produced something Winston had not yet seen from Aurascyra: no immediate answer.

She had dismantled the other arguments almost effortlessly. Constructing her own proved less convenient. Her attention moved toward Winston only after the silence had lasted long enough to become noticeable.

“I was told to stand beside your judgment. To speak plainly when the others will not. If that place means anything, then I see no reason it should suddenly cease to matter because the subject is more personal.” She hesitated, and for the first time since he had met her, Winston saw Aurascyra searching for words she found difficult rather than merely precise. “If we are discussing who should be first after Hippolyta, then I see no reason that should suddenly cease to matter simply because the subject is more personal.”

Penthascara folded her arms, evidently unconvinced. “That sounds remarkably like an argument for precedence.”

Irritation sharpened Aurascyra’s answer. “It is an argument for not allowing you to appoint yourself.”

“I did not appoint myself. I demanded the position.” Penthascara let the distinction sit for only a moment before adding, “Which is exactly what you are doing.”

Aurascyra had already drawn breath to object. Nothing followed.

Her grip shifted on the spear as the argument turned back on her, and for once there was no immediate correction waiting behind her eyes. When she finally looked toward Winston, the annoyance had not disappeared. It had simply lost its target.

“Yes,” she admitted. “I suppose I am.”

Retreat would have been easier. Instead she held Winston’s gaze, colour beginning to rise in her face despite the steadiness of her voice.

“I want it, "the admission left the others quiet.

Aurascyra seemed to hear how nakedly she had said it only after the words were already between them. Her fingers tightened once around the spearshaft, but she did not take them back. “If we are all expected to pretend we have no preference simply because admitting one is embarrassing, then I decline.”

Winston’s amusement surfaced despite himself. “That does sound like you.”

Whatever discomfort remained, Aurascyra had apparently decided it was no longer worth negotiating with. “I am aware. And I still want it.”

Penthascara looked ready to answer. Xanthibarqa had already shifted as though preparing to do the same.

Neither got the chance.

At the edge of the group, the thumb that had been moving slowly across a knuckle went still. Helisparga let her hands separate and took one quiet step forward, not enough to challenge anyone’s place, only enough that continuing without her would now require doing so deliberately.

“No.”

The interruption was so soft that it took a moment to alter the room, but alter it did. The argument turned toward her.

Penthascara’s surprise escaped first. “No?”

Helisparga stayed where the step had placed her. “No to being omitted.”

“I know what Hippolyta gave me. The quieter hours. Company when company is wanted, silence when it is not.”

Until then she had spoken without quite directing the words at Winston. Her thumb found the opposite knuckle again, stopped, and this time she made herself meet his eyes.

“That does not mean I have no preference about this. If one of us is to be first after Hippolyta, then I want the chance as much as they do.”

Xanthibarqa regarded her from the ground she had claimed earlier. “You did not say so.”

Something in Helisparga became still again, “I am saying so now.”

There was no challenge in the answer, only enough quiet certainty to leave Xanthibarqa with nothing immediate to push against.

The corner of Aurascyra’s mouth betrayed her first, and Penthascara caught it immediately. “Do not encourage this.”

“I have said nothing,” she stated.

Scowling Penthascara replied, “your face has.”

Aurascyra’s brows rose, the almost-smile refusing to disappear completely. “Then argue with my face.”

Penthascara looked as though she was seriously considering it. That nearly ruined Winston.

Beside him came a quiet breath of laughter. Hippolyta had still made no attempt to intervene, and by now he was beginning to suspect that watching the four of them sort themselves out was part of her plan.

The argument had left them in a formation no drill-master would have recognized.

Xanthibarqa still occupied the ground she had claimed at the beginning, apparently unwilling to surrender so much as half a pace now that retreat might be mistaken for concession. Penthascara had finally settled on folding her arms, though the posture looked less comfortable than judicial, as if she were presiding over proceedings that had somehow escaped proper regulation.

Aurascyra’s spear hovered uselessly near the floor while her expression maintained, with increasingly questionable success, that she had merely reached a conclusion and certainly had not just confessed to wanting something. Helisparga stood with her hands clasped behind her back, making the least display of any of them but no move to withdraw what she had asked for.

None of them seemed to know what came next.

That was the giveaway. Four Amazons who could probably have arranged a battlefield between them had reached the end of the argument and were simply standing there, waiting.

Winston finally looked toward Hippolyta. She had watched the entire dispute without once interfering, and by now the satisfaction at the corner of her mouth was impossible to mistake.

“You are enjoying this,” he half accused.

The Former Queen of the amazons lifted her chin fraction, utterly unapologetic. “Immensely,” she replied.