Starset arrived just as the Gifted entered and stopped at the edges of a dirt field hundreds of feet wide surrounded by a ring of redwoods. The long shadows of the trees and soft, warm colors of the starlight made the artist think of her home.
Damn, I’m missing starset with Momma and Dad. Herah thought, gazing towards the planet’s red star, obscured behind the treetops as the horizon swallowed it. Hope they’re doing well.
“Before we start, Ashbrain—”
The artist blinked then turned her sight onto the soothsayer. Alex leaned against one of the border trees, four fingers raised.
“I’ll give myself four handicaps.”
A growl rumbled in Herah’s throat, and Rose's visage flashed in her mind.
“You think you can afford that?”
The soothsayer raised a brow and scoffed.
“Only cowards go all out when crushing bugs.”
“Alex!” Max shouted, stepping up next to her brother and punching his arm.
“Don’t defend me, Max!” the artist barked out, green flames flaring from her mouth and nose.
The liar paused and frowned at Herah before stepping back into the tree-line where the binder hung with his floating, glowing rock. Both Owen and Max stunk more and more of frustration and worry.
The artist cringed, her stomach ditch turning to a stomach pit.
“S—”
“Watch your tongue, Ashbrain.”
Herah paused then locked eyes with Alex. The soothsayer sneered, and the artist snarled.
“You haven’t won, I don’t answer to you, Os de Bâton.”
“Stick-bones, right? You need better insults.”
Alex wagged his four fingers at Herah.
“Let’s cover the limits already.”
The artist held her tongue.
“One,” the soothsayer began, “I won’t use my Presence or Will. Two, I won’t hurt you until your fourth attack. Three, if you hit me once, I’ll admit defeat. Four, if I don’t beat you with one hit, you also win.”
As Alex talked, Herah jogged backwards to the opposite edge of the dirt-clearing. The artist took a moment to measure the distance between the pair.
Two hundred ertèmas, a little smaller than the gym.
“It took you six attacks to do anything last time, and that was with your will.” Herah shouted, rolling her shoulders. “You want to lose?”
“My terms are far more open than you believe,” the soothsayer responded, not raising his volume. “Plus I know you better now, Ashbrain. I’ll only need one.”
A grin that nagged at Herah and words that nagged even further followed.
“Not like you could even punch me. Only your fire or gift have a chance at touching me.”
Herah let slip another growl.
“Is that all?”
“Sure, start when you wish.”
The artist took a deep breath, her lungs swelling with red flames.
All the bigger problems are out of the way with you. I can just focus on your Gift and your physicals. When I caught Owen earlier, you attacked about half my max speed. Assuming that was casual movement and going off how long it took for you to react to me catching the smith, you’re likely about two-thirds as fast as me at max. While I’m sure I’m faster, you’re still close enough in speed that I’ll have to work to hit you no matter my method, but which one will I go with? If I want to out-speed you physically, I’ll need at least three seconds to speed up, though I could just top out at four. But if I went with my fire I could do so from the start. Fire or fist? Fire or fist?
Herah looked down to her hands, and they throbbed. Not painfully but hypnotically. A rhythm formed with every shake. A rhythm off beat.
And it’ll only find the beat, Alex’s last words rung in her ears. Once I feel your skin against my scales again.
The artist grinned to herself and balled her fist.
Such a grave insult against me! But I’ll prove your folly. I’ll play this stupid game of yours, Alex. I’ll finish this with my fourth hit and take you down with a punch. If you can hold back, so can I! I’ll show how small the gap between us really is!
Looking back up, Herah locked eyes with the grinning soothsayer as a blue ball of light seeped out of his chest and fell into the ground.
That must be the light I have to avoid, shouldn’t be that hard if I don’t stay still.
Once again, the memory of her battle with Rose rose from her flame. A tingle ran up her spine and her blood rushed through her veins. Saliva began to amass within her mouth. Herah wouldn’t admit it aloud, but this fight wasn’t just for her pride.
This should be fun.
Lungs bloated with fire, the artist spat out a wave of red flames. Stretching from her left to her right, the wall surged across the field with scorching heat and lit up the dimming forest.
One.
Alex had no path for retreat. Instead, the soothsayer dragged a foot across the dirt and said, with his divine voice,
“I control the earth.”
No sonic booms yet, I shouldn’t be able to hear you.
Just as the fire wave got to the middle of the clearing, all the ground between it and Alex erupted. A stone wall as tall as the trees and as thick as half the clearing formed. Centimeters before impact, Herah imagined the flames hotter. The fire turned orange and seared through most of the sudden obstruction. At the last stretch, the flames halted, slamming into and flowing up but not quite over the soothsayer’s rock defense.
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Herah crouched and unfurled her wings. With narrowed eyes, her wings stretched then flapped. The artist shot forward and flipped, blasting straight through her flames and the wall with a dropkick. Stone and fire dispersed as Alex ducked under the attack, his eyes closed.
Two.
Now, Herah shot straight for a tree.
I’ll bounce off it, and use the rest to build up speed. the artist thought, spreading her legs for impact.
Herah slammed feet first through the tree, reducing it to splinters and dust.
Fuck! the artist screamed internally, chiding herself while tumbling through the air and blasting through more trees. The Donneur de Frêne’s meadow lay in her current direction. Should’ve realized how fragile these things were when I took one out with those shitty arrows!
Mind racing and unwilling to lose more momentum, Herah reached back towards the clearing. Flames spewed from the tips of her talons, and a fiery hand extended to and wrapped around a redwood at the edge of the clearing. Owen and Max stood by the tree, both watching the artist with wide eyes and open mouths.
Hooked on, the artist imagined the flame limb like rubber. It stretched and stretched and stretched as her momentum carried her miles away, right past the Donneur de Frêne. After a second, the fire limb grew taut, and Herah hung parallel to the ground.
In the blink of an eye, the artist snapped back towards the battlefield. Flying through the middle of the clearing, Herah flipped till her head pointed down. Time slowed and a glance had the artist meeting the soothsayer’s eyes. Alex sat grinning just out of arm’s reach. The stale butteriness of amusement greeted Herah’s nose.
Just you wait, the artist thought with a grin of her own and rising salivation. A single thought dispersed her flaming hand. Another mental command expanded her flame clothing into a fiery aura. You won’t know what hit you.
Herah stuck her arms out and spun. Fireballs exploded from her aura and shot everywhere in a scattered and seemingly random pattern. But as the artist flew towards another tree, one with a ball of her flames hovering in front of it, Herah commanded each ball to solidify and flatten.
Time sped up again as the artist flipped and slammed feet first into her sideways fire platform. Landing in a crouch, Herah took in the hundreds of footholds now scattered all across the sky and clearing. Her grin widened.
Might as well go max speed.
Wings at her back, Herah sprung towards an opposing platform.
Then to another.
And another.
And another.
For four seconds, Herah bounced between the flaming platforms, building up momentum. Each bounce left a trail of fire behind, and the artist flew so fast thousands of red flames hung over the dirt clearing as a fiery web by the time her velocity could climb no higher.
All throughout her bouncing, Herah kept track of the soothsayer’s scent and his face. Alex’s smell remained steady and unflinching, though as the artist predicted, it shifted slower than her current speed. His eyes tracked her flaming trail, not her speeding body.
However, his grin had yet to fade.
A chill crept up Herah’s spine. The artist ignored it.
Now, to set you up.
Herah bounced up and towards a fire platform high in the sky, sat right beneath the clouds of the still setting star. Flipping again, the artist’s feet met flames. The instant her toes touched, Herah imagined the fire like rubber. A stretching membrane of flames wrapped around her form, which sunk further up into the air. The artist thrust her hands out and towards the ground.
The web of fire crashed down all around the soothsayer. Alex swept his eyes across the sea of flames. Now rising above the clouds as her platform stretched to its limits around her feet, Herah crossed her arms. The fire on the ground surged up, forming towering waves. All set to fall atop the soothsayer.
Three.
The earth beneath Alex rumbled, then exploded. The soothsayer rocketed into the sky, sailing past the flames and treetops and towards the artist.
There!
Herah shot down like a bullet. Condensing her flame aura back into shorts and a shirt, the artist reared back her fist. The soothsayer’s eyes widened, darting about as they lost track of Herah, and his grin disappeared.
His scent remained unphased.
It went ignored.
Centimeters from her opponent, the artist felt time slow. His arms rose but far too late. A rush, a hunger forced Herah’s grin into a feral smile. Air far too slow to move out of the way ignited surrounding her hand. Her fist shot forward aimed straight for Alex’s chest.
FOUR!
The soothsayer’s eyes snapped right to the artist’s, and his grin reemerged.
A flash of light blinded Herah. Thin but sharp pain like needles showered her eyes as the artist spun out of control and her fist struck only air. A warm, fuzzy sensation like a ball of electricity appeared in her skull.
When—
“Your impact will rebound on you.”
Herah struck the ground at full speed.
BOOM!
Pain seized her body as light no longer blinded the artist, but dirt and far more dust now filled her vision. Shutting her eyes, Herah knew only agony and a profound wrongness throughout her entirety. Her gums itched and felt sticky and wet, while blood and shards of her spine sticking up from her throat made it impossible for her bottom lip to do more than quiver. Her top one didn’t register for some reason. Her wings felt lighter but wouldn’t move. Couldn’t. Her limbs weren’t arranged proper, her left foot buried through her skull while her right hand sat inside her chest. Her fingers and toes ached, twitching their only capability.
What? Herah thought, as the warmth of her flame began burning away at her broken form. Crashing at top speed isn’t supposed to do this.
The warm and fuzzy ball still filled her brain.
Fuck! Must be Alex’s light. But, I didn’t it even feel it enter. How?
But the artist could worry about the specifics after healing. While mangled far more here than in her battle with Rose, Herah’s flame was strong enough to erase the damage wrought and let her hop back into the fight.
Looks like you won’t win this with one hit after all.
The thought brought the artist little comfort, tears pricking at the corners of her eyes. Herah would love to blame them on the pain.
“Healing drains you.” Alex’s disembodied voice sounded in the artist’s ear.
Herah felt different in a vague, near indescribable way. Her only way to grasp this change was her flame feeling alien to her body and mind. As her fire engulfed her form and repaired it, the artist felt it cool far too fast.
No, no—
“No!” Herah screamed as her healing completed, and her flame felt like embers in her chest. Limbs heavy, body soaked in blood, and muscles on fire, the artist dragged herself up and onto her knees. The texture of rock, smooth and rough, registered beneath her fingers and toes, though the dust swarming around kept her eyes closed. A single flourish of her wings sent a gale of wind dispersing the cloud.
The artist opened her eyes and looked up. Spots filled her vision, and it blurred in and out while Herah fought with her eyes to keep them open. In spite of the trouble, the artist could tell a crater surrounded her.
A crater wide enough to lay across with two others her height and deep enough… well her current state left depth too difficult to realize.
1. Must. Stand. Every word had to be its own sentence, the task of stringing them together too hard.
Herah attempted to rise, but her knees and hands sought the stone as soon as they left it. Eyes pointed at the ground, her nose flared and her lips twitched in and out of a frown while her fingers failed to ball themselves into fist. Tears fled her eyes.
“Merde. Merde. Merde!”
“You made two mistakes, Ashbrain.”
The artist looked up and the stippling across her vision made making Alex out impossible, but her nose caught his scent.
Ten feet away.
“What?” Herah asked, through gritted teeth.
“While you were right in assuming I’m slower than you naturally, you never considered my Gift might be able to amplify my speed or that the speed of my Gift was faster. Like you, I can speed up how fast I process the world. Unlike you, I can speed it up to a point that you’re frozen to me. The speed of my light is determined by the speed of my thoughts. Mistake one.”
Five feet away.
The artist couldn’t even curse anymore, darkness encroaching upon her vision.
“Mistake two, you let me goad you into using your fists as the only means to actually hurt me. I wasn’t lying when I said you could only hit me with your flames or gift. You can do so much with your fire and make so much, I’d be hard met to not at least get singed. I’d still win in a fight of course, but this wasn’t a fight.”
A foot away.
“You’re tough and you’re strong, but you’re stupid. Luckily for us, I’ll be doing the thinking you can’t. Because, I am the victor.”
Herah wanted to growl, to bite, to scream. The artist instead coughed up smoke and collapsed, unable to even stay on her knees.
The fight couldn’t be over yet, her loss couldn’t be so quick or so easy. Ten seconds. The longest the battle could’ve been. And one hit, the flash of light blinding Herah. The rebound and draining of her fire, both adverse effects, but neither the artist would call a hit.
Your terms were more open than I realized.
A Cendreux brought down by a single hit. A truly humiliating defeat. For no greater reason than her own shortsightedness.
"Votre victoire, Alex."
“I’ll take that as you admitting defeat. Now get some sleep, I’ll need you well rested.”
The darkness finally engulfed Herah.