Mandalorian Revived

Chapter 34

Our blades lock. My head is pounding, but it's not from the physical demands of this fight. It's from the stakes that just keep mounting higher and higher because of it. I have to win.

If I lose, we lose Mandalore. Ragnar loses his chance to free Bo Katan and get her and Din out of here. The others may not reach Grogu in time to get him out. Everyone, probably, will die.

I can't exactly push those thoughts from my mind as Lira presses on. Our sabers are a blur of lights flickering around us in a frenzy as we move. Through the chaos, I manage to push Lira further from the Forges.

"You just can't stay out of all this, can you?" She growls, swiping her saber right at my neck. I arch back, pressing my palm to the ground and balancing as the crimson blade swoops above my face. I pop back up and use the force to push her back a few feet.

The sound of a lightsaber igniting makes me pause and I risk a glance toward the others. Ragnar is using the shorter saber to free Bo Katan from her chains. She falls to the ground.

"Take him and go, now!" I spin around in time to block Lira's next attack. She's angrier now, her eyes glowing yellow with hatred. I've freed her leverage.

"Not without you!" Din yells back, staggering to his feet. It's a nice sentiment, but we really don't have the time for it.

I can't even answer him. Lira won't give me enough recovery time between attacks. I use the flames in my vambrace to catch her by surprise and she cries out. She staggers back a few steps, cradling her forearm. Her sleeve is burnt off and the skin beneath is angry and red. When her eyes find mine again, I smirk.

"I'll kill you for that, apprentice," she seethes.

I shrug. "You'll try to."

I bear down on her with an overhead strike full of power. I can feel it humming through the Darksaber. I ignite my longer lightsaber, the one I still have with me, and add it to the attack. Dual-wielding feels more natural now anyway.

I call on everything I learned with Pre Vizsla as a child. Everything I learned watching the Mandalorians. Everything from Lira. From Luke, Ahsoka and Anakin. Everything I've ever learned when it comes to fighting, I throw it at her.

And she's just barely keeping up.

"What happens when this ends, hm?" She purrs, locking our blades again. I glare up at her as she presses further, positioning herself above me. "Do you kill me? You couldn't do it before."

She spins her saber hilt and it scrapes my knuckles. I cry out, my pressure against her blade weakening. The skin on my knuckles is as raw and burned as her arm. Her hilt slams the longer saber out of my grip in the process and sends it across the room.

I gasp out a breath and fall to one knee.

She leans forward. Our faces are inches apart. "As long as I am alive," she whispers, "I'll keep coming for them. I won't rest until your precious clan's blood is dripping on this stone."

With a fierce cry, I shove her blade back and clumsily swing the Darksaber at her. She blocks without a thought.

"Tara!" Din is trying to reach us. He can't, she'll only kill him if he does.

And now, of course, the ground is rumbling beneath us.

"What's that?" Bo snaps.

Lira glares at me, though both of us are too busy gaining our balance to fight. "Part of your invasion, perhaps?"

I shake my head. "For once, this isn't me."

Then we hear it.

A deafening, shrieking roar from above. From the surface. And somehow, I recognize it. It's a sound I've never heard before in my life except in dreams. It's powerful enough, deep enough, to make the stone above us crumble and plummet to the ground. I can feel my bones practically singing with the recognition of it.