The Darkness Before the Dawn (Dark Sun: Chronicles of Athas 2)

"Don't just stand there, jab him!" he yelled at her.

"I would if you'd stay out of the way!" she shouted back as she jabbed at the dwarf. "Quit jumping around so much!"

"He's got a sword! I'm not letting him slice me with it just so you can get a clear shot. Spear him!"

The crowd had grown quiet, waiting for a bloody wound to cheer, but Jedra's and Kayan's words brought laughter from a few people close enough to hear them.

"Fight!" the dwarf hissed. "They laugh at you!"

"What do you think we're trying to do?" Jedra demanded, swinging his club at Lothar's legs. He connected that time, and knocked the surprised dwarf's feet out from under him.

Kayan stabbed at him with her spear, but the point stuck in his belly armor and did no damage. Jedra leaped forward and clubbed him on the head, but Lothar swung back with the inner curve of his sword and sliced deep into Jedra's right leg.

Jedra flinched backward, bleeding heavily from the wound, and the crowd cheered at the sight of blood.

Lothar tried to get up, but Kayan held him pinned to the ground. "Hit him!" she screamed. "Hit him!"

Jedra tried, but Lothar kept waving the sword faster than he could dodge, all the while struggling to throw off Kayan's weight at the end of the spear and get up again. Jedra stuck his shield into the blur of metal, but Lothar managed to curve the blade around the edge of it and slice his arm.

Bleeding from two places now, Jedra flailed away with his club in a blind panic. Lothar seemed to be able to parry every blow, though, and now he was winning his shoving match with Kayan as well.

If he got up, they were dead. Jedra was already losing strength, and if the dwarf got past him, Kayan had no defense. She couldn't fight in close with a spear, and her entire left side was bare where he had sliced open her armor. Frantic, Jedra did the only thing he could think of: he kicked sand in Lothar's face. It didn't go anywhere near the dwarf's eyes, not until he kicked a second time and helped it along psionically. It was such a sudden impulse that the psionicists stationed around the perimeter had no chance to react.

Either that or they had decided it was fair use; either way, Lothar cursed as the sand momentarily blinded him, and Jedra took the opportunity to slip past the dwarf's guard and knock the sword from his hand. It flew end over end out of reach, and Jedra struck again, this time hitting his opponent squarely in his right side. The dwarf's brittle chitin armor shattered, and Jedra hit him again on the same spot.

Lothar groaned and tried to kick himself away, but Jedra swung at his leg, breaking it the same way he had broken Sahalik's. He swung at the dwarf's head, but missed and knocked the spear loose, where it gouged a deep wound across Lothar's chest before sticking against a rib.

The crowd was on its feet now, cheering and shouting, "Kill, kill, kill!" but now that the dwarf was disarmed and crippled, Jedra backed away. He looked up at the stands, then over at the arena entrance where Sahalik stood watching. The elf drew a finger across his throat in an unmistakable gesture, but Jedra couldn't do it.

He looked up again at the stands and at the rows of balconies where the king and his templars sat. He couldn't see the king in the glare, so he held his hand out to block the sun. A sudden hush spread across the crowd. Jedra heard the creak as every person there turned to look at the balconies.

"I don't know," she whispered back.

"You've asked for mercy," Lothar said through clenched teeth. "Very sporting of you, but if I'd wanted it I'd have asked for it myself."

"You don't want mercy?" Jedra asked, stunned.

"Do I look like a weakling?" the dwarf spat.

There was movement on the balcony. Jedra squinted, and saw a single figure in a golden robe hold out a fist, thumb down.

The crowd roared its approval. People shouted "Kill him!" and within seconds it had become a chant.

Lothar may not have been a weakling, but he didn't want to die, either. He scrabbled toward his sword, kicking with his good leg and pulling himself along with his arms. Jedra reluctantly hit him again in the shoulder, crippling him further.

Tears were streaming from Jedra's eyes now. "I can't do this!" he cried, backing away.

The crowd began to boo, and pieces of rotted fruit and even hunks of spoiled meat began pelting the sand around them. Kayan looked up just in time to dodge a melon, then she snatched the club from Jedra's hand, stepped up to Lothar, and swung it at his head. The crack of club on bone echoed all the way across the arena, and Lothar jerked once, then lay still.

Jedra turned away and threw up. In the sudden silence that greeted his ungladiatorlike action, Kayan whispered, "Bow to the king, damn it!"

Thankful that he'd at least managed to turn away from the king to throw up, Jedra managed to stand and turn around, then bow. He looked at the fallen dwarf, then at Kayan.

"How could you do that?" he asked, suddenly disgusted at the sight of her.

"Don't get all haughty on me," she said, then she lowered her voice and whispered, "I hit him just hard enough to knock him out, and I amplified the noise so it sounded like I'd killed him."

"Oh!" Suddenly mollified, he retrieved his club from her, and they began to walk back toward the slave pens at the base of the ziggurat, relieved to think that they had survived their first battle without having to kill anyone. The cleanup team-two slaves, one with a shovel-passed them on their way out to retrieve the body.