The building was quiet. A thick musk radiated from the oakwood flooring and mixed with the rich scent of wine coming from the goblet in Gawayen’s hand. His back rested against a throne sheathed in brown leather as he looked on at the five figures kneeling before him. Two men, three women, four failures and one success.
They kneeled in a V shape before him. It was no illusion who the success story was. All of them knew, and they all hated her for it. Each one had been hand picked by Gawayen himself, for the sole purpose of becoming his successor, the next mother or father of Avalon. They had all gone through the same training, the rituals, trials, and now there was a single victor. Ayna.
She was the only one of the five with her head held high, staring at her master in utter adoration. She was the only one who was allowed to. The rest of them, the failures, would be demoted from their prime position and returned to their former roles as captains of the army. It was this distinction, this simple removal of status, that had alienated the young woman from her contemporaries.
Slowly Gawayen leaned forward. The only sounds in the room were the liquids that sloshed in his goblet, the light breathing of the people in front of him and the creak of leather beneath him; his silence spoke for itself. He stared at the four figures who knelt before him in failure, feeling the rage at their loss radiate off them like heat. He smirked, took a sip of the wine and then finally addressed them.
“Well done Ayna. You've not disappointed me. The tasks were hard and a lesser person would've failed." he stopped and pointedly stared at the others before continuing, “Your work is not done, but you have proved you have the mettle of a leader within you, and the ability to supersede her. You are the hope of our kingdom and the figure tasked with preparing against my... progeny."
The woman nodded before bowing forwards and kissing the ground before him. She was silent, reverent as she gazed at him; a gaze that only broke when her head touched the floor. In response Gawayen simply smiled.
Time ticked by, moments became seconds, seconds twisted into minutes, and soon enough the young woman had bowed silently before the monolith of a man for ten minutes straight. Finally Gawayen smiled, leaning back and quietly sipping from his goblet. “Rise Ayna. You may stand by me.” immediately the woman sprung to her feet and strode to his left hand side before turning back to her former rivals. “So as your first task, you are going to decide what to do with your former rivals."
“My lord?” Ayna turned, obviously surprised she would be given such a defining task so quickly. She swallowed, glancing at Gawayen for a moment before turning back to the people kneeled before her. Her gaze hardened as she thought about the things that they had been through, the terrors of training under the strongest Kimbramancer in the entirety of Avalon, and the alienation she felt when it was clear that she was the favourite, the likely winner. She looked down upon them now, their petty jabs, the traps that they had set up in order to watch her fall, and now she only felt pity. The rage was gone. “They will fight, and the winners will stand by my side as my lieutenants."
“The losers are better off as corpses,” Gawayen replied, sealing the order in stone.
There was a beat as the four figures before Gawayen and Ayna processed the order, but soon enough the man and woman in the back pulled out their weapons and attacked the two who sat before them as they turned round. The woman in the back managed to sink her knife into the kidney of the woman in the front, pushing herself to the side and dragging the knife until it snagged against bone. The other woman let out a high pitched scream that ended in a gurgle as the knife sliced through her spinal column with some force. Her body collapsed forwards and she twitched in shock and rage as she slowly came to realise that her lungs could not work. She was suffocating slowly as she bled out from the wound on her back. As she pulled the knife out and wiped it on her enemy’s clothing, the first woman sat back and took a deep breath, watching the fight between the two men, ready to spring like a trap.
The fight between the two men was far less clean than that of the two women. The man at the back did not have a knife as his weapon of choice, so when he pulled out his hatchet, the blow took instants longer to prepare. Instants that he simply could not spare for a clean kill.
“Now Mari has won, who do you think will survive from the men?” Gawayen asked Ayna with a smirk.
“Sir, I think that Mord will likely be the winner. Despite him being disadvantaged by Tomas’ early attack, he is by far the most capable fighter amongst the four of them... the three of them." As she finished speaking Ayna could not help but glance at the woman who was now breathing her last breaths on the floor of this hall they had lived and trained in for months. It was a stark wakeup call to her. She already thought herself a tough woman, but compared to Gaywayen she was still as soft as a newborn babe. She needed to correct that.
The fight continued on between the two men, with Mord, the second man, having retrieved a simple club made of bone. He had been jarred by the sneak attack, but it had not done any lasting damage and now he was fully prepared, with his weapon out. The club sang as it split the air, crashing against Tomas’ hand, and hatchet. There was a snap as bone and wood splintered under the immense force of the club strike. Tomas recoiled as the handle shattered in his grip, with shards of wood sinking into his palm. Desperately he grasped at the hatchet-head with his intact hand and swung it at Mord’s face, cutting into his nose and sending a chunk of it skittering between Gawayen’s feet.
Mord recoiled, instinctively bringing his club to his face and almost dropping it in the process. He grabbed the stump where his nose used to be and flung his weapon at Tomas, catching him in the collar. There was a second sickening crack as his left collarbone shattered under the force of the club. In shock, Tomas dropped what was left of his axe, and tumbled away from Mord.
As the broken body of the blond man tumbled away Mord let out a scream of pain. In seeming unison to the club striking Tomas in the collar, Tomas’ axehead sank through the flesh in Mord’s leg, splitting the meat and femoral artery below the skin. Blood began pumping out of his body in droves, pushing through his fingers as he desperately tried to hold back the tide of life leaving him. Tomas raised his head and smirked through the pain. Pulling his still functioning right arm up beside him, he pointed his crippled hand at Mord and began chanting under his breath before swinging the arm away quickly before shouting with all the force he could muster “DRAIN!”
In response to Tomas’ shout bone piercings began glowing and cracking from the draining force of the spell, while the blood flowing from Mord’s leg only intensified as a great force began pulling it out and funneling it towards Tomas. The blood wrapped around Tomas’ wounds and within seconds he was able to stand up, both bone injuries fully healed from the nourishment provided by Mord’s blood. As he rose to his feet, the blood surrounding Tomas collected and transformed into a hooded robe, obscuring his figure more and more as Mord was completely drained of the life-giving fluid that he so desperately needed.
Mord’s corpse collapsed as the man died and Tomas bowed towards Ayna and Gawayen, before turning and looking at his partner in victory. As the two survivors of the miniature battle royale processed their own survival, Gawayen smiled. He stretched his arm out and placed his hand on Ayna’s lower back, pulling her towards him until she was forced to perch upon the arms of his leather throne. She sat straight, but he could tell that she was uncomfortable, just how he wanted her. “So the most capable fighter fell, why do you think that was the case?”
“Sir, if I may be frank, luck and opportunism."
Gawayen turned to look at Ayna, surprised. “Oh? Why do you say such a thing?”
“Well he got lucky in the fight, which lead to his path to victory. He was smart to take it, and his original reaction to the first strike was competent, but his shining moment was when he chanced into cutting Mord’s leg open. He probably could have actually cast drain from Mord's nose injury, the blood-flow was enough, but it likely would have given more time to respond."
“So you don't think the axe falling on Mord's leg was planned at all?”
“Not at all. It was a fluke, which is why when coupled with his injury it was an impossibility for Mord to deal with. Tomas took advantage perfectly, nonetheless."
Gawayen was silent for a moment before laughing harshly. “I agree with you. But I will add that Mord was stupid, and his choice of weapon was unbefitting for a Kimbramancer. One can do all sorts of damage to a body without breaking the skin, and we all know that without breaking the skin of our target all of the blood hexes are useless.
“So what now, little miss leader?”
Ayna blushed slightly. “The survivors get rewarded. They may use the bones of their opponents as piercings and hexfodder. The blood is drained, so that is used, but the meat will be repurposed into food for the troops."
“And the skin?”
“Removed and hung at the gates of the camp,” Ayna replied with steel in her voice. “People should be reminded of the price of failure for Avalon. If we fail then we are doomed."
Gawayen smirked. “Good girl!”
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