Against

Against - Chapter 5

Chapter 5

The Dwarve was dark-skinned and lethal. His thick eyebrows were furrowed in madness as he swung around a mallet with the head of a horse, the eyes glinting silver and orange from the flames. The Dwarves roared viciously, pleased with dinner and a show. All Elanil could do was tighten her fists around the thick hilt, pray to Arallah and try and plan for a tactical way out.

The Dwarven Warrior wasted no time in attacking, coming directly at her with hard, consecutive blows; left, right then straight down, which formed a pattern. Elanil dodged them well, her speed facing his brute strength with ferocity. She coiled, ready to dodge another blow, but he switched tactics and kicked her hard, making her fall back into the muddy earth. She could feel the heat of the bonfire singe her hair and she scrambled up, using all her strength to block the horse head with the sword.

The clash of metal on metal rang louder than the shouts and she felt the shock jarred her very bone marrow. Her arms dropped to her side, shaken and useless as the Dwarve brought his hands around again to strike. She could see the tendons in his shoulder ripple with pure power and her heart almost jumped straight out of her chest, already willing itself to overwork itself and leap into the warrior’s mouth to be eaten.

Everything went in slow motion. The mallet was almost near shoulder height when she heard the shouts slow down and her blood pumping in her ears. Everything became warm, but her calves were fire hot. Within seconds, the horse staring down at her above the Dwarves head, she knew what to do. She stepped sideways with her Elven agility, dropped the sword and kicked embers up. The coal hit their mark, sparking in his face.

The Dwarve reeled back, dropping the silver horsehead and shaking the glowing pebbles from his face, making them hook on his frizzy beard and singeing the hair, creating tiny fires. They all fused together and started blazing on his chin. He began screaming aloud, his deep voice was grated and hollow. As he beat his chin to kill the flames, his flesh began charring and the smell travelled through the air. Elanil stared at him as he fell to his knees, his meaty hands hovering over his cheeks as his hair caught on fire too.

All the Dwarves were stunned, some angry and raged out loud but knew they couldn’t enter the fighting ring. In the unbreakable wall of bodies, there was a tiny gap where two Dwarves were so confused that they turned towards each other and were shouting phrases, creating a small gap as they were smaller sideways, luckily. Behind them was the long wooden bench and table full of food. Elanil saw this  opening and tried her luck.

She ran towards it, vaulting almost above the Dwarves heads and landed on the table in a crouch, the food clattering all around her, and began to sprint down the length of the table. She took just a few steps before hands were right at her heels, grabbing her and making her stumble as she kicked plates out of the way and knocked over ale and wine.

A hand shot out suddenly, gripping her forearm compared to the ones normally at her ankles and dragged her off the table and onto the floor, where from all angles she was gripped tightly. The Chief

shouted loud and furiously, spittle dribbled down his beard and fell on her neck and face. Elanil could feel her stomach tighten and shrivel until she was certain her body would fold in half.

The language reverberated in her brain and all she could see were hulking bodies and faces of deranged animals. Fürn let out a roar and everyone jumped back in unison, standing away from Elanil and behind him. The translator was suddenly by his side and spoke quickly, glancing back at Elanil, getting replies and angered grunts as he spoke, before he turned to her.

“Fürn is angurd abowt ye runnin’ end seys you’s needs to have yer head off. But, he also knows ye won the fight, end for that, all ye have to do is a favour end ye’ll be let free.”

Blindly agreeing to a favour she had no idea about seemed like an extremely bad idea, but she knew another attempt at trying to leave their vicinity was futile and would end up with her head on a spike, being thrown in the air and danced with around the large fire. So she agreed and stood up.

She was led by the translator back to her cage, the moon made the stone seem like silver instead of grey. The bow and quiver was handed to her and she felt so relieved to have them back in her possession that she almost kissed the wood. Instead, an apathetic look was plastered on her face as she suited up.

A few more minutes and she sat on Sylfaen once again, being led to the edge of the Dwarven camp. On her map, the location of the Giant camp was marked and she set off, the deep shadows of the woods cloaked her in darkness.