Disclaimer: Yes all belongs to Tamora, except the characters that are obviously made up, which are mine.

A/N: This is my first TP fiction and I hope that all of you will like it as much as I have enjoyed writing. Kudos to those who know what the title means, review and tell me what you think it is.

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"Ouch!" A young girl of about seven yelled at a girl who looked equal to herself. The girl who had yelled was sitting in the dirt glaring up at the other girl who had knocked her down.

"Oh quite being a baby and get up!" The standing girl exclaimed reaching out a hand to help her sister out of the mud. The girl reached up and clasped hands, and in one quick, practiced movement she pulled hard on her sister's hand and pushed up with her feet, causing her sister to go flying face first into the mud and herself to stand up.

"Well that went well." A smirk showing on the girls' face.

Alendle and Arcadia of the fief Dunsmuir were twins. Each with long, sleek black hair that reached to the middle of their backs and dark blue eyes. They lived a life of two young boys not two young girls, they worked the land and went to Corus every month to sell their goods with their father.

A short plump woman leaning on the windowsill, which looked out over the large orchards of apples, cherries, and pears, watching the two girls wrestle. She laughed at how it was always a constant battle between them, yet they always seemed to come out of everything the same, with a tie.

"Girls! Supper's on the table." Both heads turned toward the sound of their mother's voice and then Arcadia who had been knocked down first, now looked down at her sister, who still sat in her place and said.

"Last one there chases chickens tonight!" And in a flash both girls were racing towards the house at lightning speed.

The twins had been born into a time of opportunity and a time of great trouble in Tortall. War was threatening every second between Scanra and Galla, and somehow Tortall would be caught in the crossfire. They had however been born into a time where they would have a choice of what to do with their lives.

On one side they could grow up like any other girl their age, and go to the convent to be prepared for marriage. And on the other hand they had a choice of going to the royal palace in Corus to train and become knights of Tortall. Even though there had only been two women knights before their time, one of which changed history, and the other being brave and fighting for a life that she wanted for herself, their parents believed that they needed to know that they had a choice.

Even though these two girls could possibly bring their family great wealth being sent off to be married, their parents had made a promise that the choice would be the girls' alone. Now that they were approaching their eighth birthdays, their father and mother had been talking of their training. If they were going to go to the palace, they had to have a little background on use of weapons and so on.

"I'm going to the market again in two days." The twin's father announced as they all sat around the table eating their meal. The girls looked up excitedly at their father.

"Are we going to sell the cherries this time?" Alendle asked with a mouth full of food. Both girls awaited their father's answer, picking cherries was the best part of gardening, they had the best cherries around and the twins knew well how good they really were.

When their father didn't answer, they glanced sideways at each other and Arcadia started to ask the question her sister had just asked.

"No, the cherries aren't quite ready yet to be picked, plus hardly any of them actually make it to the market, you two always seem to find a way to eat them all." Their mother, Lalee, said with amusement in her voice.

"Girls, I've been thinking about you two lately." Their father finely said. They both turned to him with questioning looks; they didn't always get this at dinner. "Your almost eight, and yes I do know that it's still two years off, but you two need to start thinking about going to the convent or the palace."

There was a long awkward silence, during which the twins were taken back by their father's remark. Arcadia was the first to speak for the two.

"But we don't know yet. Why do you want to know now?"

"If you two choose to go to the palace, I need to start training you seriously in the art of weaponry. And that will take some time, so I would like to know before I go to the market." He finished.

Both girls looked at one another not knowing what to say.

"May we be excused?" Alendle asked. Their father shook his head yes, with an expression of utter disappointment. The twins then took their dishes to the kitchen, feeding their leftovers to the dog, and went silently up to their room.

"What should we do?" Alendle asked her sister, who was sitting a bed next to hers. Arcadia looked down at her fingers and then looked back up at her mirror.

"I can fight better than any boy around here, and I can fight a lot better than you. So I should go to the palace and you should go be a girl." She quickly ducked, just missing a pillow that had been thrown at her head.

"You are not! I'm just as good as you, we're twins remember." Alendle said and then quickly dodged her own pillow, which she had previously thrown at her sister.

Downstairs Alexander and Lalee of fief Dunsmuir sat drinking cool water and listening to the laughter of their twin daughters upstairs.

"Well I think that they took that very well, better than I thought they would." Alex said. Lalee looked sharply at him and replied,

"Why are you making them chose so soon, Alex? You know that they don't know yet, and you're only giving them two days?"

"But don't you hear them up there? They're not crying or yelling at me, I think they already know and have known what they want to choose for quite a while, don't you?" Alex said shifting under his wife's glare. She sighed and shook her head, looking out the window.

"You don't know how much I'm going to miss them." Lalee stood and picked up the rest of the dishes on the table.

N N

A dark figure sat on the branch of a tall pine tree watching as a slim figured girl picked fruit from a tree. The sweat that poured down her face told it that she had been working hard for a long time. A laugh escaped its lips before it disappeared with a snap.

Alendle used the back of her hand to wipe the sweat off of her forehead, and then reached out and grabbed another apple and throwing it back, catching it with her gift and placing it lightly in the large wicker basket strapped to her back.

This was the last spring she would be spending at home, because that fall she and her twin sister would be riding for the royal palace in Corus, the capitol of Tortal. Now that the legendary Alanna of Pirates Swoop had paved a way for female knights, and then the first girl to train after her, Keldry of Mildren, the two girls were going to be in a line of many more to come.

Alendle fished for another apple in the branches in her reach without success, she felt the tip of her fingers touch an apple and extended her arm as far as she could. She then loosened her grip on the branch with her legs and leaned forward just enough to grab the apple. The apple in hand she sat up and threw it back, just before she realized that she had fallen off of the tree branch.

A young girl walked out of the back door of her country house into the orchards with an empty basket, waiting to be filled once more. She threw the basket's strap over her shoulder and slung the basket behind her. She started to walk out into the orchard when she spotted her sister hovering a few inches above the ground.

"Alendle, what are you doing?" Arcadia, Alendle's twin sister, yelled to the hovering figure.

"Arcadia, please help me!" Alendle pleaded in a scared voice. Alendle had closed her eyes ready for impact and then she had just never hit.

"How are you doing that, Alendle?" Arcadia had finally reached her sister, ignoring her plea for help and was circling her looking at her body, which was hovering at just above her waist. She slowly reached out her hand and poked her sister seeing if she would move.

"Arcadia! I asked for help, not for you to come and poke at me. Now help me down!" Alendle screamed at her sister.

"Why can't you get down by yourself? You got up there didn't you?" Arcadia said after backing away from her sister.

"I can't get down, because I don't know how I'm doing this. I was reaching for an apple and then the next thing I know I'm falling off of the tree. Now I'm like this and I really want to get down." Alendle explained in a worried voice. Arcadia looked at her sister and then removed her basket and placing on the ground, then removed Alendle's basket also. She then took a hold of her sister's middle and pulled hard.

Nothing happened, Arcadia continued to pull on her sister until Alendle yelled,

"Stop now, Arcadia it's starting to hurt."

"Well what do you want me to do?" Arcadia asked putting her hands on her hips. Alendle looked around her, try to think of something.

"What about using your gift?" She asked.

"Well if you don't know how you got there, how am I supposed to know how to get you down?" Arcadia asked. She could tell that Alendle was starting to panic, and she had to think of something quick. She couldn't call for their parents, because they both had gone to Corus early that morning, to sell goods and to buy supplies. The girls had been left to tend to the farm. She took a deep breath and put her hands out in front of her.

Slowly dark blue magic flowed from her fingers and started to engulf her sister. The magic began to get thicker and started to blaze brightly. Alendle closed her eyes and bite down on her bottom lip.

Then Arcadia felt a pull on her magic and when she pulled back, it seemed to tighten its grip on her sister. There was something else keeping Alendle up there, and it wasn't letting go. Arcadia scowled and yelled with her mind, through her magic,

You let go of my sister, before I get really mad.

Arcadia pulled hard with her gift and then she heard a distant laughing, whoever was holding on to her sister was laughing at her. And then Alendle came crashing down onto the ground, which knocked the breath right out of her. She lay there for a minute, catching her breath and then sat up looking at her sister.

"Arcadia, what's wrong?" Arcadia was staring up at a branch in the large pine tree that sat alone at the end of their land.

"It's laughing at me."