Against Her Gentle Sword - action-packed love story

Chapters 1-4

© 2014 by Alan Stroe. All Rights Reserved. Please do not redistribute without the author’s permission.

Contents

The Last Day of School        2

The Young Matriarchs        5

The Musketeers        8

The First Duel        12

The Last Day of School

Some philosophers of the Old Era argued that beauty is relative, while others vehemently opposed the notion. Centuries later, psychologists settled the matter when they discovered that humans, even as infants across cultures, prefer average proportions and symmetry. It is not our intent to resume this ancient debate here. It is enough to state this much: in the year when our story begins, a senior high school student named Gwendolyn was universally considered to be the most beautiful girl on the Colony island.

Her beauty is noteworthy not for its own sake, but for the devilish, universal effect it had on the school’s male population; perhaps not coincidentally, but rather causatively, Gwendolyn’s undeniable physical beauty was remarkably devoid of vanity and paired with an altruistic character. The Colony’s educational system went to great lengths to cultivate such values, of course, just as they tried to eradicate violence from society. The Colony’s leaders and law enforcers were always recruited from the female students who best demonstrated these qualities. Born of a maternal line that had given several high ranking officials, and even a Governor or two, Gwendolyn was a prime example of the type most appreciated by the Colony’s senior leaders. She was also an accomplished electro-fencer, another prerequisite for a Protectress License.

Halfway through their senior year, elite senior girls were recruited and tested for the prestigious Protectress License, which gave them the right to bear electro-weapons in order to uphold the law and order in the Colony.

At the end of the year, senior boys anxiously hoped to be Selected for an electro-sword dueling Tournament—the first and only time in their lives when violent behavior would be tolerated, even celebrated. The prize: a chance to catch the eye of one of the young, desirable Protectresses and marry well. The Selection process was a rather mysterious procedure, haphazard and bureaucratic at the same time. Most of the Tournament candidates were Selected by the new Protectresses wishing to include them in their personal competitions. The Selections, however, were also subject to approval by the mysterious and feared Assurance of Quality Reproduction committee. Among other duties, AQR had the power to approve or deny Selections and Reproductive Licenses.

By tradition, the Selection notifications were delivered at the end of the last day of the school year. Perhaps nowhere was the excitement greater than in senior homeroom C—Gwendolyn’s. The boys of homeroom C had shared the same classes with her for the past four years. Surely, most of the C boys rationalized, she’s bound to be interested in someone, surely someone she sees all the time. Why not me?

Dario, the shortest boy in homeroom C, was no exception. The silent, unseen barrier between female and male classmates was generally very difficult to overcome except for the most congenial and extroverted of boys. Doubly so with a girl as desirable as Gwendolyn. Desperately so for an introverted boy like Dario. Over the previous four years, he had amassed a huge collection of little positive signs from her: quick glances, chance eye contact that he was always eager to meet and quick to interrupt, the occasional innocent brush as she passed by him at recess, or a warm smile—anything at all. He had written them all down in an encrypted journal at home. After four years, the thickness of the journal made a very compelling case. His gut feeling seemed to concur, but not constantly and not without doubts.