Elven Sword Fight (Hunger Games Re-Draft)

Overhead two dragons collided, the smaller black beast knocked across the sky, towards a small hollow separated from the main fighting by a mountain range covered in singed and smoldering trees. The dragons crashed together again, falling closer toward the grassy plain below them, each snarling and snapping their jaws at the other’s neck.

Astana was knocked from the back of her dragon as the larger red one crashed into him again. Rakia, doing little to assist her ruby colored dragon in the battle, gracefully leapt from its back and landed lightly on the ground.

Rakia jerked her blade from its scabbard as she started toward Astana, who was laying on the ground moaning from her decidedly less graceful drop. Rakia buried the tip of her sword in the ground where Astana’s head laid moments before. Annoyed, but not particularly surprised, Rakia looked up to find her opponent charging her, sword in hand.

The two blades crashed together with a clang that echoed throughout the valley. The two women, though fairly young, were both expert swordswomen. Each prepared herself for the long, all-too-familiar dance that was to come. The dance of dodging the sharp blade of her old foe before attacking with a series of slashes and stabs of her own. Red sparks flew through the air and stung the arms and faces both women as the blades came together and quickly flew apart again.

Rakia's blade grew heavy in her weary hand. No matter how fiercely or skillfully she fought, her blade struck nothing but Astana's steel. She felt her energy quickly dwindling as she attacked more powerfully than ever before, desperately channeling every ounce of strength she could muster into her aching arms. Each blow was harder than the last, both to deliver and block. Each blow left her covered in just a little more sweat.

Rakia’s arms and shoulders glistened nearly as much as her breastplate did in the bright sunlight of the late afternoon. Her armor, the lightest in the land, grew heavy on her sore body. She noticed her own breathing become labored and knew that she must end the battle quickly, or risk a loss. No one could afford her losing. She shifted her weight, preparing to deliver the final blow that would, with any luck, send Astana’s head tumbling to the now trampled grass beneath their feet.

Astana saw her opponent shift, and realized what was about to come. She quickly threw herself forward, into an offensive position, trying to force Rakia onto the defense. Astana lifted her blade over her head, preparing to deliver her most powerful blow yet; the blow that she hoped would slice through her opponent’s defense and into her heart, that treacherous little organ that started all of the problems they now faced.

Rakia saw that her former friend, Astana, intended to reclaim the offense, but refused. Instead she planted her feet more firmly and angled her blade upward, to catch Astana’s blade as it descended.

The blades came together with a bone rattling force that jarred the swordswomen’s arms and shattered the swords. Instead of pulling away, each woman stared dumbly at her throbbing hands and the hilt still resting there.

Their blades were made by a Master Elven blacksmith in the fires of Mt. Tudor, rumored to be the hottest volcano in the world. Each woman personally watched as her tutor selected the strongest steel and folded it hundreds, possibly, thousands of times. Never before was an Elven blade known to break, and it took both women by surprise.

Rakia thought back to her childhood days, when she and Astana sparred with wooden swords for hours in the small clearing behind her father’s house. Even as children, the possessed the strength to shatter wooden blades used by the human men that sometimes visited, bringing their shoddy weapons, begging for instruction with their swordplay.

How did she deal with it when she found herself standing with only a wooden stub in her hands? She tried to recall. They sparred only for pleasure in those days, to sharpen their own abilities and, sometimes, to show off, if they had an audience. They particularly liked sparring for the easily impressed humans. They never dreamed it would come to this though; to the two of them on opposite sides of a war. To one lying down her life by the other’s hand.

Rakia threw down the now worthless hilt and leapt on Astana. They fell to the trampled grass in a fury of fists and elbows. As trained in hand-to-hand combat as they were in swordsmanship, the first blood appeared in mere seconds.

They fought for several long minutes, each punching the other and clawing at her opponent’s armor. Time ticked on. The dragons were still roaring and snarling somewhere overhead, shaking the ground occasionally as one was driven into the hillside by the other.

By the time a quarter of an hour passed, each woman was covered in blood, both of her own and that of her opponent’s, stripped of the little armor she started with, and utterly exhausted.

Astana rolled onto Rakia's back, grabbed a fistful of Rakia's fair hair, and slammed her head into a small stone that was half-buried in the hard ground beneath them. Rakia muttered a string of curses as she dug her finger nails into Astana's back.

Rakia threw Astana off of her back and stumbled to her feet. Roughly, she wiped the back of her hand across her forehead in a failed attempt to divert the blood that trickled into her eyes. Staggering backwards, disoriented from the loss of vision in her right eye, she directed her cursing more purposefully. “Cheating bitch.”

"Sticks and stones Rakia...” Astana looked down at the half-buried rock and smirked. “Literally.”

“Poor Astana,” Rakia snarled, smiling mirthlessly. “Still as foolish and unwitty as ever.”

“At least I'll be alive a minute from now.”

"Don't be too sure.”

Astana, who always favored a fight to talking, leapt at Rakia and tackled her to the ground, wrapping her fingers around Rakia’s throat and squeezing as hard as she could. Rakia thrashed and clawed at Astana's fingers as she struggled for a breath of air, refusing to let the fight end this way.

Rakia was the last person living who knew enough swordplay and enough about Astana to finish her. If she didn’t get the job done, the entire country and, possibly, the world would be subject to Astana’s dictatorship for years to come. Astana might live for decades yet; worse yet, she might leave behind an heir. If there was ever a hope of her evil ending, it was now.

Rakia forced her knee between their chests and forced Astana onto the ground beside her. Without a moment’s hesitation Rakia leapt on Astana’s back and pounded the back of her neck with her fists, ignoring the aching in her hands and blood on her split knuckles. She roughly rolled Astana over onto her back and straddled her slender waist as she searched for a weapon.

A rough sandstone rock.

"Guess not," Rakia sneered, as she snatched the stone and lifted it above her head.

A wave of panic washed over Astana's face, and she lifted her hands fearfully, trying to stop the rock’s decent.

"Kia, no!"

It was too late to stop the attack, even if Rakia were so inclined. The rock was already in course, not to be dissuaded by a pet name, as Rakia might've been. It was hard enough to think of Astana as nothing more than an enemy to begin with; but for Astana to call her 'Kia' as though they were still nine years old and best friends? That was just cruel.

The rock crashed into Astana's forehead, stilling her instantly. Rakia reached down with trembling hand and felt a faint pulse still coursing through Astana’s neck. She might live if Rakia were to get her to a medic soon enough.

No. She's not the girl you were friends with anymore. She chases the shadows now, Rakia reminded herself, shaking herself. She slowly grasped each side of Astana’s chin and, with tears spilling down her cheeks, snapped the neck of her former companion.

“My old friend,” Rakia whispered as she stood, staring at the woman at her feet.

The wind blew Rakia’s blood and dirt stained hair out of her battered face. Her shoulders shook with exertion as she glanced up into the sky, still panting. Astana wasn’t the only one who took damage in the fight.

The wind stilled and the valley was filled with an eerie silence. The dragons were nowhere to be seen, or heard. Suddenly Rakia heard a crashing in the woods on the hill to her right, and turned to peer darkness of the forest, hoping to see her beloved dragon emerging as victor. A twig snapped near the edge of the woods and a bowstring twanged.

Rakia spotted the archer, crouched by a fallen log, in the edge of the forest. A moment later, a moment too late, she spotted the arrow heading straight for her. She didn’t have time to react, or even time enough to be frightened.

The arrow pierced her fair skin, right above her collar bone. She fell back onto Astana, grasping her neck. Hot, sticky blood oozed out of the wounds, onto her hands, before dripping down the side of her neck. Her eyes took in The Great Blue Sky, the sun blinding her as it warmed her face.

As her vision started to fade, Rakia saw the dragons burst from the clouds and plummet towards the ground. The beasts landed a few yards away from the women, suddenly more interested into their riders than their fight, surprised to see both lying on the ground.

They snarled at each other a long moment, then Rakia saw Zadora sink her fangs into the black dragon's neck a momemnt before her vision faded away into utter darkness. A moment later Rakia heard Zadora roar triumphantly.

The war is finally over. Rakia breathed a sigh of relief.

Suddenly the roar ended, mid-way through, as Rakia's hearing slipped away a moment. Her consciousness was quick to follow, and she lay dead.

Three long years of battle, finally ended. Without their Elven leaders, the human men would have no way to continue the war. The two Elven women who lay dead in the open field were who the men looked to for courage, training, and strategy.

Without them, there was no war. It was over at last.