Rekindle

26

I swung.

She ducked and slashed at my face, but I leaned back and missed the blade by millimeters. She balled her switchblade hand into a fist and went at me.

Tom had trained me well. I could block most of her punches, focused on nothing but defense in the moment. As soon as she fatigued, then I would take the initiative, but she was growing faster and fiercer with each swing and jab. It was getting harder to see her in the night-doused room, but it was enough. I was doing enough to stay alive.

I didn't expect her foot to kick me straight in the stomach, feeling the little food I had in it travel up my throat. Her fist came back and hit me across the face, and then another kick straight to my chest. I gasped as the wind was knocked out of me, stumbling back, falling to my knees. I expected another hit, but there was a break in the fighting.

Panting and clutching my stomach, I looked up at Bridget abandoning her switchblade at the other end of the room, picking up one of the decent sized throwing knives she had dropped instead. I hadn't noticed they were slightly larger than regular ones. She strode toward me and tossed it up, catching it by the handle, arm bent back, ready to decapitate me.

I rolled right and reached for her wrist with my left, the injured one, crying out in pain but handling it all the same. I brought her to the ground, scrambling to pin her down, struggling to get her wrists behind her back. She had transferred the knife to her other hand in the tumble and was set to slice the top of my wrist to break me off, but I yanked it back. She cut herself, screaming out, and I was too stunned to take any action as first blood spilled. The knife slapped me across the face, pain ripping through the entire left side of my cheek. I could feel the sting of a cut along my jawline as I rolled off of her. Commotion crescendoed outside the closed door. I heard shouts.

Bridget grabbed a hold of both of my ankles and dragged me to the other side of the room, knife still in hand. I clawed at the carpet and screamed with rugburn, of all fucking things. Her hands let go of my ankles, and she kicked me in the stomach, hard. I gasped and curled up, fighting the pain. Another kick, to the ribs. She pulled me up by my collar with a blade pressed to my cheek and threw me into the spindle-legged desk, knocking the entire thing over. I saw her close in and sprung to my feet, despite knowing I was entirely too beaten up to fight well, beaten up and fatigued beyond belief.. All she had was a cut and no remorse.

I ducked her right hook and hit back with a hard uppercut. She swung with the knife, aimed at my throat. I ducked once more and roundhouse kicked her, catching her straight in the jaw with my heel. She stumbled back and dropped the knife with a gasp of pain, bloody blade landing between us. With a terrifying war cry, she marched forward and kicked me into the toppled desk. Legs stuck out on either side of me, limiting escape options. My head hit the wooden bottom of the desk with a loud thump, making the world spin a moment. The knives she dropped lay to my left, her right. She straddled me, digging her knees into my thighs, hands forcing me against the desk. Hazel bore into blue, perfect teeth grit. I thought I heard another shout from the hall.

"Look what you've done," she said to me. "Look at the mess you've made."

I pursed my lips and swung my fist into her cheek. She spewed blood, lip gushing.

Her hand came back and slapped me across the face, right on my cut, hard. "How dare you!" she yelled, shoving me up against the desk again. "How dare you cut me off!"

I hit her again, weaker. My arms were tired.

Her fist came back and punched me straight in the nose. I screamed out in pain, louder than necessary as blood immediately poured across my mouth. I tasted metal.