Ryan felt the a familiar numbness. It came to him in all battles, sweeping in with a thunderous ferocity that brought both a measure of pleasure and an eerie calm. It was the pleasure that he despised. He told himself that he had no hatred for the creature that stood before him, that he felt nothing as she issued her enraged battle cry and came toward him across the sand covered floor of their battle ground. But he did feel something, and that something was the thing that kept him awake at night. That something brought the nightmares of the fire and the burning and the blood that had encompassed his being so long ago. He had been death's fiercest warrior, slaughtering without pity, without mercy.
That same something made him fear for his family and their fate if he did not win this match and the others after it. He knew well the horror of war, the diseases of the battle engorged mind. He knew that to murder women and children, entire families was nothing for a warrior who had even a small taste of what he was feeling right now.
She came at him with the fury of one depraved. There was something about her movements that lacked caution, even common sense. They were movements inspired by the fury that desperation lent. She hated him. He had recognized that instantly. He had a hazy picture of her and her kind somewhere in the back of his mind, the image smelled of blood and death. The image shamed him. He knew that he had wronged her deeply, somehow, or at least she felt he did.
He pitied her, but he would show her no pity in battle. She had her agonies and he had his, and this is where fate had taken them. There was no mercy, no pity in the arena, and Ryan did not believe in self sacrifice, even if he deserved nothing more than to lay at the ground at her feet in a pool of his own blood.
Not today.
Today he would fight. Today she would die, her wrongs, sadly, unavenged. The lives of his family depended on his survival. He did not dare think on anything else.
She checked herself, got control of her hatred and the slitted yellow eyes of the gargoyle followed him as he moved to circle her. " You will die today murderer of children," she hissed.
She slashed at him suddenly with her tail. Pain exploded in his shoulder. The tough gray-green skin cut like metal, opening his flesh up, exposing his blood and thick white muscle to the sun.
The crowd roared. " First blood," they shouted, frenzied.
She laughed, triumph riding in her yellow eyes.
It was not rage that Ryan felt when he dipped low and came at her suddenly, nor was it a quest for revenge for the scar given, or the humiliating screeching of the crowd at the sight of his blood. He had many scars, from many battles, far too many to count. He cared nothing for what the crowd of blood thirsty hounds seated above them thought. No, it was a simple desire to win that propelled him. The desire to end this battle and begin the next and the next after that until he stood with his foot upon Calirith's bloody, oozing skull.
She slashed at him with the dirks she carried, even as his sword cut across her mid-section and thinly opened the flesh there. Her guts strained against the broken encasement of her flesh. He brought his sword up again, ignoring the pain of the twin wounds she had opened on his chest. He went for her throat, meaning to do her in and be done with it.
She saw him coming, saw his intent and kicked at him with her strong legs and clawed feet. He stumbled backward just a little but it was enought for her to put some distance between them.
Ryan watched her, feeling the blood oozing thinly from his body. Above them, the crowd went mad. His world became the all encompassing howl of their many voices combined. His opponent stepped sideways, shifted in the dirt and sand. She eyed him cautiously, hatefully. Then she howled and came at him again, the dirks crossed at her chest, the tail darted in and out all around him, tearing at his face and head.
She was strong and when she crashed into him it took every ounce of his strength not to fall backwards. Falling would have meant his death and he was not going to die here today. He steadied himself and sent his sword in a slashing arc that connected with her shoulder and took her arm off above the elbow. Black blood rained upwards and clouded his eyes as she screamed and fell to the ground before him.
He barely noticed the agony of the dirk that was stuck, maybe an inch deep, in his right thigh. They had healers and magicians in the arena for such pains. The main thing that a contestant had to do was stay alive, as long as one was breathing then the healers could fix any wound, no matter how bad it was, for the next fight. It made for good business, the people paid more to see their favorite fighter fight again and again and again . . .
He towered over her and she scrambled back in the sand, slashing at him with her tail and the tiny jewel encrusted dirk she held in her one good hand.
" FINISH IT!" the crowd screamed, the crowd shouted, the battle was his.
Ryan . . .
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