The Turtle and the Falcon

[Remedy]

closed

I. hate. to. fight.

It was one of those things that really set my teeth on edge. Why can’t people just talk things out? Surely in every situation there is a win-win element? At least, that is what I had been taught, and what I believed in. Unfortunately truth is rarely universal, and often completely ignored. Such then was life that one would be forced to fight. This was another truth, sitting neatly under the first. Once one took both those into consideration, then one found there was necessity in know how to fight. It was that truth that brought me to the Citadel, and forcing myself to do things that I didn’t really want to do.

At least the area that I was going to fight in looked pretty. It was a small clearing, surrounded by high golden stalks of wheat. They moved in unison, ripples of gold caressed by the winds gentle hand. The sky was a nice contrast blue to the wheat’s gold and was dotted with clouds that broke the sun’s harsh gaze to a manageable glance.

I normally carried with me a dozen small bags of things I was transporting or working on. It felt somewhat weird that I was wearing only my leather jacket and pants. I felt lighter, but more exposed. At my sides were the two iron daggers that I only grudgingly used, and on my hands two gloves of my particular craftsmanship. Behind me, nestled into the small of my back was a bag I used for holding useful things.

I pulled out a pair of polarised goggles and slide them over my amber eyes. I instantly felt better somewhat shielded by from the intermittent sun. The strap fit around over my ears and through my fiery red hair. Somewhat prepared, I placed my hands on my hips and waited.

[Hailwing Of The Citadel]

Summoned once more, Hailwing appeared in the clearing two dozen paces from Winona, his arrival a bedazzling spectacle of multiple blue-hued rays of light encircling and spinning about his stone body. It would have been difficult to tell through the brightness of the lights, but the warrior was slowly coming to life as chips of grey slid off of him. It took just a few moments for him to animate, his skin bright pink with life and his first breaths coming heavy and deep.

The lights disappeared and he was awake. The air was crisp, the sun warm. He needed to blink several times in order to get his bearings, his yellowed eyes looking about in interest, drinking in the setting.

Below him he felt the crunch of flattened crops, a bed of straw pressed down against the ground and encircled by a field of wheat. He wore thin cloth shoes, and could feel the warmth of the sun-baked strands through them. He wore little - a shirt would not contain his sprouting wings - but black linen pants kept him modest. A thick leather belt ran below his belly button, and on the back of it was a small harness holding his glaive. The weapon was as tall as he was, worn high so that the wicked, curved blade of the polearm poked out from behind his head.

A breeze set the surrounding crops to dancing. He heard the billow of the wind in his ears alongside the gentle flutter of the wheat moving, like a gentle rainfall.

His eyes then settled on Winona, and he immediately tried to peer into her goggles to make eye contact. From this distance, he appraised her to be much smaller than him; tiny, even. Her hair stood in stark contract to the golden wall behind her. He could not make out any of the finer details of the girl.

This was the second small redheaded girl he'd been summoned to battle in recent weeks, a detail he found just slightly interesting.

"Greetings," he called, "My name is Hailwing." It wasn't, quite. Hailwing was a name given to him by users of the Citadel - this creature, manifested and brought to life to populate these battle arenas, had no true name. "Tell me when you are prepared to start."

He spoke in a deep, clear voice, but lacked the inflection of a human. Hailwing lacked curiosity and interest the same way any other tool did.

[Remedy]

Perhaps it was providence that I was wearing the the shaded goggles, or just dumb luck, but either way I was treated to a sighed that I believed many others would have missed. Now, trying to articulate it is somewhat difficult, even for someone with such a refined and delicate way with words such as myself. It seemed the man that had entered our small clearing had shed a stone skin of some sort.Looking at him, he wasn’t unattractive if you like those stone chiseled types.

“I am Remedy, and I can get you a great deal on stone polish once we finished Mister Hailwing.” I ventured, flashing my pearly whites in a big grin, “Or a strong dwarven forged file if you’d like to lose a few pounds.”

I was somewhat disappointed at a lack of response. But then, what exactly had I expected? I let one of my hands slip from my waist around behind my back and pulled a small glass ball from within. These grenades were something of my own design, and contained a condensed magical flame with a small release timer. I felt the timer and adjusted it to five sections.

“This might do well to kick off the fight. It’ll signal the start.” I tossed the small flickering glass grenade to Hailwing. Ideally he’d catch it and then; boom. With the same smile smeared across my face, I pulled out the copper rod that had been pressed along my left forearm so it extended over my left hand. The contraption on my arm focused electricity along the rod and across the glove itself. This was the first test of its new capacity.

[Hailwing Of The Citadel]

Though lacking the time or ability to study in his time outside of the Citadel, Hailwing had been created with preloaded knowledge of some things - combat, history, geography, and information on all sorts of items, both Althanian in nature and not. The glass grenade was deceptive in its design. The warrior certainly recognized its shape, but could not be certain what to expect from the surprise projectile. He had to play it as safely as possible; glass shattered easily, and the design's purpose was likely revealed by the choice of material.

So when Winona lobbed the orb over, he was prepared and stepped widely aside. He watched it sail past and crumble into shards on the ground, spewing bright orange licks of fire across the flattened wheat. The flames caught hold of the dry strands and ate away at them hungrily, beginning to burn a hole toward whatever lay beneath, unlikely to spread much further.

Hailwing was already producing the lengthy glaive from his back, bringing it forth in a sideways grip as he stalked toward the young redhead. She had brought out a weapon of her own, one that he did not have enough knowledge understand precisely, but that he surmised could be as elegantly constructed as the devastating bomb of fire.

He wanted to cut her off from simply dancing around him, and also keep her in range and limit the needed time to launch projectiles his way. Hailwing tried to close the gap so that he was in the center of the clearing, giving Winona little room to maneuver beyond the edge of the crops - whether he was successful would depend on her own movement.

Once he was in range of attack, Hailwing struck out with the long blade of the polearm, its tip aimed for the broadest target available: the chest area between her shoulders.