The Fenrir Saga - Part I

Chapter 42

 - Beonnie -

The next day, I woke up early. We had one fight left, and if we won today, it would mean we had won the group and had climbed from the bottom to the top of the lowest-ranked group of packs in the Tournament and subsequently in the Prospect. This would allow us to challenge the lowest teams in the group above us, hopefully gaining the rank we needed to get the territory we wanted with no questions asked.

Being out for a day after the first fight, I completely missed our pack's rise to popularity. Vidar was the subject of every she-wolf's lips, and I had turned into some sort of boy favourite. The attention was uncomfortable, to say the least. Getting flowers sent to your tent at a fight tournament is ridiculous. Vidar got underwear, though, which was worse. However, he didn't seem to mind the attention, basking in the longing looks as we walked towards the arena for our third fight.

The Gathering was crowded now as all the packs had arrived in full, as we were closing in on the dates when the higher-ranked packs would fight. Alpha Neron Johnson swept by, and Vile pointed out the Alpha of the Dark Mountain Pack to me as we passed their camp. A muscular, tall, dark-haired man I wouldn't want to meet in a dark alley. He looked up when we walked by, eyes falling on Vidar and then on me. The usual protocol was otherwise people noticing Vidar, glancing at me and then back at the perfect physique of Vidar. This time, the eyes of Alpha Moss Rivers never left me, burning holes in my back as I walked away. Their training grounds were just inside their fence, but their camp was behind a wooden plank, and it seemed they were still building their camp as I could hear the rustling of metal from behind the planks. The warriors on the training ground looked fierce, and I was glad we wouldn't face them at all.

"You still decided to go without the berserk today?" Vidar shot me a worried glance as we continued our walk down the walkway to the locker room. "It will hurt."

Vile and Trevor were going to hang out at the marketplace today, and there was going to be a bonfire at the beach tonight, and I wanted to go too. Therefore, I decided to avoid going berserk for as long as possible during the fight, a decision that no one in my team liked. At all. None of them had used this ability in any of the fights; not even Vile and I had conflicting thoughts about being the only one doing it. However, Hild had also used the berserk yesterday, I had been told, obviously not being able to talk to her by myself. She was in our apartment and would probably wake up right about when I walked onto the pitch.

On the one hand, it gave me strength and numbed the pain. On the other hand, I felt like I cheated. On the other hand, I was a girl. On the other hand, I believed girls could fight, too, so why didn't I do it in a normal state? On the other hand, the berserk was part of me, so why did I try to convince myself to do something else? But I wanted to go to the bonfire and maybe meet other people my age who weren't Vile or Trevor... or others.

Therefore, I was in a clear state of mind when I walked out onto the pitch, but it quickly changed as I saw our opponents. They were second in rank in our group before the Tournament, but they felt like the biggest ones. Once again, they outnumbered us, and my clear state of mind evolved into dizziness and fear.

"You alright?" Vidar noticed me staggering even before the fight started.

I never got a chance to reply as the fight started, and their warriors charged at us. They had done their due diligence and figured out that knocking me out would leave Vidar to concentrate on only his opponents fully, but as long as I was up and about, he would be slightly distracted by my opponents, too. 

I circled my current enemy, a shorter man, younger than most warriors and perhaps new at this like me. We gauged each other, trying to find out the best way to move forward, and I had just decided on the gash move by Hild when someone punched me in the back. I fell forward on my knees at the sudden impact, only to be hit on the chin by the man in front of me. This made me fall backwards, and for a few fleeting seconds, I was disoriented. Long enough, though, to get another punch in the stomach, making me launch forward. I realised I had to get up and get away from this. A foot approached my face, but I managed to avoid it through some miracle. The man before me temporarily lost his balance, as the impact he had expected never came. I got into a kneeling position, with his one knee within reach. Staggering up, I kicked him on the side of his leg, knee-high, and the crackling sound made me want to throw up. One was down, but the one behind me didn't wait for me to find him, and I got another punch in the back, making me lose all the air in my lungs. He swung around me, and as I staggered forward from the back punch, I could enjoy the lovely feeling of a knee in my stomach and a fist on my cheek.