The Calm Before the Chain
The gate behind him closed like the lid of a tomb. The metal rang with finality, and Matthew Dismantler of the Realm took his first breath of the BlackSand Arena.
The air was dry, thick with sun and blood, and smelled faintly of burnt spices and dried entrails. But underneath it all, beneath the violence and ash, he could still catch the note of incense rising from his armor. That familiar, woody sweetness, like cedar oil and clove, with a green finish that reminded him of temple halls and forest canopies.
He inhaled slowly, letting the scent center him. That shoppe in the mountains. The one with shelves of herbs and little green bottles. Felt impossibly far away. But for a heartbeat, he could almost smell it again.
He touched the chest of his banded armor. Gold-silver runiticity ore, warm to the touch, polished and scented by the Green Hat Wizard outside the tree wall of Green Wizard City. Somewhere inside the layered metal, a calming aura pulsed outward, subtle magic that, in the right company, dulled anger like a slow-spilling tonic.
It would not protect him from the chain. But maybe it would slow the edge of madness that followed it.
On his shoulder, Kippie the falcon gave a low, slow squawk.
“Gate’s still open, boss. I say we make a run for it. We could start that shoppe in the mountains. Sell mushrooms. Maybe sandwiches.”
Matthew adjusted his grip on the bo staff. Seven feet of carved lightwood etched with faded runes, balanced perfectly for a two-handed grip. It was not elegant anymore. The surface was chipped near the base. He'd jammed it into too many rib cages to keep it pristine.
But it still felt like home in his hands.
“No running today,” he said calmly.
“Stupid day for courage,” Kippie muttered, fluttering his wings and hopping higher along the leather harness on Matthew’s back.
Matthew smiled faintly beneath the narrow visor of his green knight helm. His gloves tightened around the haft of the bo. He stretched once. Shoulders back. Chest open. Deep breath in.
Heart rate steady. Muscles warm. He was ready.
The horn blared. The gate began to rise. Light split through the tunnel like a sword.
And Matthew, walking alone, walked toward death, or the coin that might heal his homeland.
She stepped out like she had already won.
The name had echoed in the holding pits the night before. Passed from warrior to whisperer like the memory of a scar. She was tall, but not towering. Broad, but not bulky.
What made her dangerous was not her size.
It was the absence of hesitation.
She did not blink. Did not scan the crowd. Did not glance at Matthew.
She just walked to the center of the arena, dragging the spiked chain behind her like it belonged there. Like it was part of her.
Matthew slowed his step, letting the sunlight bleach the sand around his boots.
The roar of the crowd swelled above them. Thousands of voices thundered across the dome, a collapsing wave of breathless hunger.
No one called his name. They called hers.
“She’s popular,” Kippie said, tilting his head. “Maybe we should start throwing elbows. Get some drama in.”
Matthew didn’t answer. He watched the chain sway like a lazy serpent behind her.
She only had one ear. The other side of her skull was a battered mess of scar tissue. Her back, half-exposed beneath the straps of boiled leather, was laced with lash marks.
Not decorative. Not ritualistic. These were from captivity.
Pain without purpose.
She had been a slave. That much was clear. And she hadn’t healed. She had sharpened.
Her fingers curled around the chain like it had once curled around her.
Matthew exhaled, slow and controlled. The rune of Neptune hung heavy beneath his armor. He tapped it once, not for magic. For calm.
“You could talk to her,” Kippie offered. “Try the empathy angle. ‘Hey, I’m a forest guy, you’re a vengeance chick, we both smell good.’ That sort of thing.”
“She’s not here for conversation,” Matthew murmured.
“No, but she might talk to a stick upside her head.”
Bernadette had stopped moving. She stood still in the center of the arena, chain coiled loosely by her feet, one hand slack and the other resting lightly at her side.
She was waiting. Calculating.
And Matthew, watching her movements, felt something familiar stir. The way she stood, the silence. she wasn’t here for show.
She was here to end something. Just like him.
She did not want to perform. She wanted to finish.
The signal came. A hiss of air through the horns, sharp and long. They moved.
Matthew did not charge. He didn’t need to. He shifted left, feet gliding smoothly over the sand, body low, staff held across his chest like a bow in waiting.
His helmet filtered the glare, giving the world a greenish hue, like watching a memory play out underwater.
Bernadette did not chase him. She let him circle.
Her chain moved. A lazy spin, just one loop to test weight and range.
He saw it. The subtle tension in her left shoulder. The counterbalance in her hips. She knew what she was doing. More than a brute. She was trained.
He darted in, feinting low, then swept the bo in a vertical arc. A probing strike. Fast but clean.
She stepped into it. Not away. Into.
The staff cracked against her shoulder, but she was already inside his guard. Her knee slammed into his thigh with brutal force.
He twisted, absorbing the hit, pulling back with instinct. The staff came up just in time to catch the weight of the chain.
It hit like a bell.
The spike missed, but the impact didn’t. The bo groaned under pressure, bending just short of splintering.
He disengaged. Three paces back. Resetting.
She came again. No roar. No grunt. Just purpose.
He shifted his stance, breath even, the bo between them like a heartbeat. Tap. Tap. Tap. Every movement deliberate.
Matthew danced. He let the calming aura pulse outward, subtly numbing the edges of fear in the air.
Maybe it worked on the crowd. Maybe it worked on her. He didn’t know.
But he kept moving. Kept the bo between them, landing glancing hits on her thighs, shoulders, once nearly catching her wrist.
She fought like she had been taught by pain.
Every swing of the chain was a question: Will this end it?
Every dodge was an answer: Not yet.
She was bleeding now. Just a little. A line along her bicep where the staff had caught her mid-swing.
Her blood soaked the sand, darker than it should be. Almost purple. Like it had thickened with old rage.
Matthew noted the hitch in her breathing. The tightened shoulder. The shifting stance.
She was starting to fade. The chain was a punisher. For both ends.
He narrowed his stance and moved in again. Staff low, angled like a rake.
She reacted. Quick. Too quick.
He baited the overreach, ducked under a wide swing, rolled across the sand, came up behind her, and...
Thunk.
The end of the staff struck the back of her knee.
She stumbled.
Matthew pressed the advantage. He swept again. Hard and low.
Her legs gave, and she dropped into the sand with a grunt, chain tangled.
He was over her in an instant, staff leveled across her collarbone.
“Yield,” he said, voice low but firm.
Her eyes met his. No fear. Just math.
“You don’t have to die,” he added. “I’m not here to kill anyone.”
She blinked. Just once.
Her lips twitched. Not a smile, not a sneer. Just a flicker of something old. Familiar. Not pity. Something closer to... regret.
Then she moved.
A sharp twist. Not to escape, but to trap.
Her chain had been loose, playing possum in the sand. She snapped it upward, wrapping it around his left ankle, then pulled.
Hard.
Matthew’s balance broke. He staggered.
She rolled to her knees, chain now in both hands. Looped and locked.
His staff came down to block, but she didn’t strike. She pulled.
The chain went taut. His leg yanked forward.
He fell. The staff scraped from his hands as the world spun.
He hit the sand, back-first.
Kippie screamed something unintelligible.
Matthew tried to twist, to get to his knees, but she was already on her feet, swinging.
The first swing missed his skull by a finger’s width.
He felt the air pressure. Heard the whistle. Saw the sun catch on the polished spike.
He rolled.
The second came down. It caught the ground just beside his ribs and kicked up a plume of black sand.
He got one knee under him. Just one.
Then she wrapped the chain around her forearm. No wind-up. Just a short, brutal arc.
Crack.
The spiked head struck the side of his helm. Not clean. Not enough to kill. But enough to shatter the world into stars.
His ears rang. His arms went numb. He fell.
Flat on his back again.
His breath came ragged now. The sun was so bright. The crowd was louder. Or maybe just closer.
Kippie’s wings beat the air above him in panicked circles.
He blinked. Tried to focus.
He saw her.
She stood above him. Covered in dust. Blood on her lip. Hair matted to one side.
Her chain dragged low, held in a lazy loop.
For a heartbeat, she looked down at him. In her eyes, he saw nothing cruel.
Just inevitability.
“You’re better than this,” he managed to say.
It wasn’t a plea. It was just a fact.
A final offer. Not for mercy, but for memory.
She didn’t answer.
The chain swung once more.
Crack.
The helm split. His skull followed.
Matthew didn’t feel the pain. He felt a memory.
A quiet room. Shelves full of colored bottles.
Kippie sitting in the window, laughing at a stupid joke. A woman coughing in the corner, smiling through the pain as he handed her something green and glowing.
That was the shoppe. That was the dream. That was what the fight was for.
He exhaled.
Kippie landed beside him.
Blood had already soaked into the black sand.
The falcon tilted his head, one eye twitching.
He looked at the body, then at Bernadette, who was already walking away.
“You could’ve let him finish the shoppe,” Kippie said.
The falcon beat his wings once. Twice.
Then he turned north. Toward the mountains. Toward the dream.
And then he was gone, vanishing into the sky.
Entered by: 0xB9D1…4eA5
