Thin rays of desperate light filtered in through gaps in the broken treeline like strands of spun gold.

  The sun spilled sluggishly into the tiny valley, tucked away between three low and densely wooded hills. The ancient pines standing watch over all.

  Two figures danced beneath the pines, jumping between pillars of light and pools of waiting shadow, their movements echoing the rhythm of heavy wingbeats as they soared overhead.

  Each step was a brutal answer to the thrusts and leaps of the other.

  Sweat dripped down to the wet grass, glistening across skin marked by the green pulse of war paint and the gleam of plated flesh.

  Neither relented even an inch to the other.

  Their eyes ---a near identical shade of brown--- met as their tired forms parted yet again.

  The woman spat a bit of blood to the floor, and grinned through red teeth.

  The Guhrani man glowered.

  A dark blue surcoat hung across plates of shifting iron that scraped together as the man moved.

  His gauntlets and helm long since tossed into the shaded grass.

  A paddle-like khanda sword long as an oar hung in his bare hands.

  Dark hair fell in damp strands, plastered by sweat, dirt, and blood across his scarred face. He gritted his teeth, anticipatory of the next attack.

  Hungry for it.

  The Eiren woman had a powerful upper body that was bare but for the winding pattern of pale green war paint which pulsed faintly as if alive.

  Nearly every scrap of flesh not adorned in paint was decorated in a pattern of pale white scars instead, the remnants of dances from long ago.

  Beneath the scars and tattoos, her shoulders rippled with unnatural power that betrayed something more than human in her ancestry. A therian.

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  Long blonde hair fell in thick, messy curls about her shoulders, bobbing to the furious and determined swings of her two-handed ax.

  She had no plan save to keep swinging until she was standing and he was not.

  ...

  Where the low hills, wide valleys, and evergreen forests out of sight were cast in the dark crimson light of the setting sun, a greater symphony continued on with no thought to the dancers and their lonely, quiet melody.

  It boomed and echoed through the rock and soil at the dancers’ feet with a cacophony of a thousand dancing swords, spears, and axes.

  A great wail rose from the valleys like an infernal wind as hundreds of men and women lie about the field, screaming, pleading, and dying.

  Hills covered in struggling warriors burst like pressed grapes from the immense heat of coordinated dragon fire, and a gentle rain of molten rock shards and razed flesh trickled down always onto the fighting throngs in the valleys below.

  Such was fighting in a war of dragons and men.

  A war horn’s bellowing cry echoed from the dread mountain fortress which loomed over all down below.

  Kaerwyn Krell had fallen.

  And with it, any last hope of resistance.

  Triumphant dragons’ cried like rolling thunder over the sounds of slaughter.

  ...

  The dancers alone in the clearing could not help but to hesitate, faltering in their strides, their weapons held low.

  They had already heard the horn, the winner was determined. Yet they had kept fighting, holding on to the contest of rivals, but now?

  Now, silence had fallen over the valleys, forests and hills.

  They were the last still fighting.

  Tears scoured the woman’s face, smearing the green paint in greasy lines. Her breathing was torn by gasps of terrible exhaustion and immeasurable grief.

  She began to scream like a wounded animal, her eyes held tightly shut against the tears.

  The soldier let out a weary sigh as he moved forwards, grip tight upon his weapon, diverting his eyes.

  Refusing to meet her gaze.

  He sprang at her, shifting his footwork as he swung the sword high and brought it low.

  He could not say if he acted out of duty then, or mercy.

  The berserker reacted faster than he surmised was possible, letting out a wail of fury and despair as she flung herself toward him in the same instant, swinging her ax blade.

  The knight’s sword met its mark, ending the dance with a deafening final note as steel passed through flesh.

  Her screams halted at once, and she fell to the side without a whimper of protest, lying on pillows of soft green grass, red eyes brimming with fresh tears.

  A sword run through her.

  Her gaze grew distant as her breathing became shallower and shallower.

  The man stood over her, staring down at what he had done. His trembling legs bore him until they could bear him no more, buckling.

  He fell onto his own side with a sharp intake of breath.

  Crimson blood spread across the vibrant blue surcoat, flowing like a river from his heart, where an ax-head lay gently at rest.

  The dancers stared on at one another. Their still forms at rest.

  Their dance was over, and there was peace in the valley at last.

  Beyond, a pillar of black smoke rises and the banner of a dragon crowned in crimson and gold sits atop the hill, blowing victoriously in the corpse-fouled wind.