As one. Always. (A Loki fan fiction)

Chapter 12

Callum smiled a slow, evil grin. He turned to one of his friends. “Fetch me my axe.” He turned back to me. “You wish to fight? Then we will fight. Here in this hall. I call for a challenge!”

Callum informed the hall of our fight. There were a few chuckles, and some worried murmurs. No one really took this seriously. Or they didn’t take me seriously. Either way, it made me angrier. As the middle of the room, usually used for dancing, cleared, I heard my name being called. I turned to see my friends coming towards me, worry in their eyes.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Loki asked me in a low voice.

“I am ensuring he never insults me again.” Replied. That didn’t ease the worry in Loki’s voice.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” He asked me.

“Yes.” I was going to do this. If I kept letting Callum disrespect me in front of everyone, it would only tell everyone I couldn’t stand up for myself.

“Then we wish you good luck.” Sif cut in before Loki could say anything else. Which I was glad for, because I needed their support. I knew that a very, very large part of nobles who were watching didn’t think I stood a chance. Callum was a lot taller than me, a lot stronger than me and had more practice. But that wasn’t really running through my mind. I was focusing on his weak spots: he was slower than me, and I could reach his back faster than he could catch me.

I walked to the center on the room, facing Callum. I glanced at my friends, who gave me reassuring smiles. Or were trying to. “The first one to disarm their opponent will be the victor. Agreed?” Callum asked me. I nodded. I was ready for this. I could feel it.

One of Callum’s friends stood between us. The room was quiet, and everyone was watching us with baited breath. I could feel all eyes on us. I could see Callum’s smug face. “Begin.” His friend said, moving aside.

We circled each other, waiting for who would make the first move. I locked my gaze with him, waiting for him to flinch. Finally, after what seemed like ages, Callum made the first move. He was a bit quicker than I predicted him to be. He came at me with his axe swinging to the side, trying to catch me off guard. I shifted back and to the side, out of his reach, springing forward to catch his exposed side. I wasn’t going to stab him; I wasn’t allowed to seriously injure him, from what I understood of challenge rules. I could give him a light wound, but the angle wasn’t right. My plan was to annoy him to the point where he messed up, and to tire him out. Just as he caught his axe to keep it from swinging farther, I shifted forward enough to punch him in the side.

He grunted a bit, before moving to catch me with his axe in the legs. I crossed my blades together to make an X, and blocked his axe long enough to move out of the way and aim a kick at Callum’s head. Unfortunately it wasn’t a fast enough kick, because he caught my shin with the handle of his axe, pushing it back. I stumbled a bit, unbalanced, and my shin stung. Callum smirked, lunging towards me while I was testing weight on my shin.

I slid to the side again, aiming a kick at his back with my injured shin. I was smarter this time, and moved quicker. He stumbled forward and I took the opportunity to kick his knees in.  He fell forward and I wrapped my arm around his neck, one blade to his throat and the other aimed at his side. Again,  I wouldn’t actually kill him, but I would make him nervous. I was so pleased with myself that I missed him elbowing me in the side. I took the first blow and toughed it out. The multiple shots that came after were hard to bear, and Callum escaped the trapped position he was in, swinging round to fight me. I backed up, and he missed, coming at me at me again.

This went on a few more times, where Callum would charge at me, miss, I would go for something, miss or hold it for a few seconds. We were surprisingly evenly matched. I was sure that the court would be getting bored after seeing this multiple times. I didn’t know though. I was too focused on Callum, too focused on what he was doing, to know that the crowd was captivated.