A/N: I'm really overwhelmed by your kind words! Thank you all so much for everything!

Ha! None of you guessed the foreshadowing right! Well, it was kind of obscure. You should get it in this chapter.

And this one is still short! I'm sorry, but I hope the content made up for the quantity.

Well, here's what you've all been waiting for: the tournament. *dramatic music plays in the background*

Part I: Shall We Dance?

Chapter 10: Of Unexpected Events and Requite

3rd POV

Katarina decided to just stay by the sidelines. It gave her a better view, and besides, she didn't want to miss a second of the battle. She watched the brothers closely as they walked into the arena.

The way Thor walked into the ring radiated confidence. He sauntered to the middle, grinning at the audience as they cheered and chanted his name, waving and laughing. His smile flashed, and the sun shone on his golden hair.

Loki's demeanor was aloof, but Katarina could see in his eyes that he was nervous. Anxious. He ignored the audience completely. He had eyes only for his brother.

The princess of Vanaheim leaned over the railing, gripping the cool metal with her hands until her knuckles turned white. She was so on edge that if you looked at her, you would've thought that she was the one that was facing Thor, not Loki.

The referee stood in the middle of the two brothers, wearing robes of bright gold. "Shake hands!" He commanded, his voice resonating throughout the stadium.

They did so, Thor smiling, Loki looking neutral.

"Prepare yourselves!" They backed away, Thor hefting Mjolnir in his hand, swinging it very slightly from side to side. Loki's hand disappeared in his cloak as he reached for a knife.

"Begin!"

OoOoOoO

They were so fast that she almost didn't catch it. Loki threw, Thor charged. The knives bounced off Mjolnir as he swung it, deflecting the blades. The firstborn of Odin brought the hammer down... right where Loki had been standing.

Confusion barely had time to cross his face before he spun around to block a blow that Loki had been aiming for his brother's shoulder. Thor was forced backwards, and for a moment, Katarina's heart lifted.

But then Thor pushed forward, and Loki jumped away again. She groaned.

Strength. Thor's forte.

He ran at Loki again, pulling Mjolnir back behind his head, but his brother was too fast, dodging, side-stepping.

It went on like that for a little while; Thor trying to land a hit while Loki ran and dodged.

"Come, brother," Thor said in an almost-whine, panting a little. "Do not run from me; it is very tiring to have to chase you down."

"Do not expect me to play ni-" Loki abruptly stopped talking and struck in mid-sentence, when Thor was least expecting it. The shock slowed his reaction time, and, before anyone could blink, there was a blade embedded in Thor's arm.

The crowd roared in outrage, rising to scream their protest, and Katarina heard quite a few "profane and ungodly words", as Loki would call it. She felt a prickle of annoyance.

They wouldn't have acted like that if Thor had hit Loki. They would have laughed. The thought made her a little sad. It is prejudice. Anything that Loki does will make them disgusted. Anything that Thor does will make them cheer. How unfair.

"A nice hit, Loki." Thor said casually, pulling the knife out of his forearm with a slight grimace. He tossed the bloodstained blade onto the dirt. "But it was merely a lucky shot."

"Well, then, good thing I'm lucky." Loki smirked, and the battle resumed once again.

And then it was close combat, and the entire crowd craned their necks to try to see what was happening. Thor pushed Loki back, and the latter grunted, a hand on his left shoulder, which seemed to be injured despite the lack of blood.

Why isn't he using magic? Katarina thought, baffled. He's an expert at it; I've seen what he can do. Why doesn't he just end it?

And then she saw his eyes look up at the audience, and it clicked. The people of the Nine Realms have never looked favorably upon sorcery. He's trying to do this with as little magic as possible, for fear that he will be mocked or blamed for foul-play.

She saw his eyes narrow. Well, he knows that he has to use it now. Otherwise this match will soon be over.

Suddenly, Loki disappeared in a flash of bright, brilliantly green light. Thor stepped back, surprised, and found that his brother was waiting for him from behind, trying to drive a knife between his shoulder blades. Thor hurriedly blocked it.

"Backstabber," Someone from the crowd hissed. "Backstabber and a coward, hiding behind tricks and illusions."

Katarina looked up, indignant, and saw that it was that awful Lord Coul, standing up. His match with Loki had been finished quickly after her outburst, and it seems like his pride was still stinging from his miserable and crushing defeat.

His eyes flicked downwards to her, and he smirked. Katarina shuddered but stared back resolutely. She didn't like the way his mouth curled upwards into a leer.

Forcing her eyes away from him, she continued to watch the battle. Now, Thor and Loki were locked in a fist-fight, Loki struggling to hold back his brother's fist as the latter was trying to fend off another dagger.

She was close enough to catch Thor's next words, quiet as they were.

"What is wrong with you, brother?" He whispered, voice strained with effort. He frowned as if he was confused. "You've never fought like this before. You are stronger now."

"Perhaps I was holding back before." Loki never took his eyes off Thor's fist.

"Or perhaps you have found some motivation."

"A deal, actually." Loki's blue-green eyes glanced momentarily towards Katarina.

"Beat him, Loki. Then we'll see." Katarina flushed a dark shade of scarlet at remembrance of her words.

Thor followed his younger brother's look and his sky-blue eyes narrowed in anger and jealousy.

"Is it her?" He hissed. "What do you want with her?"

"Are you blind, Thor? Speaking of blind..." There was another, much brighter flash of light and Thor grimaced, relinquishing his grip on Mjolnir momentarily to block his eyes. Katarina found herself looking downwards, averting her gaze as well.

"I cannot see!" Thor cried out, rubbing his eyes. He stumbled backwards, blinking frantically.

"Mm, and you shall have to wait a bit longer until you do." Loki was looking satisfied as he pulled out another knife, and threw it at his brother.

But the prince was well-accustomed to battle. He cocked his head to the side, and brought his arm up at the last second, managing to deflect it by sound alone. There was a gasp of admiration and some scattered applause from the people of the audience.

Even Katarina could not stop her eyes from widening. Thor was a warrior at heart. That much was obvious.

But Loki had a few tricks up his sleeve as well. Suddenly he duplicated, turning from one to three.

"Choose one." All of them said, smirking. "And let's hope you choose correctly."

Thor didn't like these kinds of tricks. "I refuse to play your little mind games, brother."

He raised Mjolnir to the sky, and the once-blue expanse above them darkened with black clouds. The air was suddenly filled with electricity.

Lightning. Katarina thought. I have to remember that he's the thunder god.

He brought down the hammer, pointing it at the three Loki's, and blue lightning crackled around the head, suddenly lashing out.

All three of the princes exploded, and the audience was momentarily perplexed. Huh?

And then suddenly the lightning was deflected back at Thor, with twice the power, and he was forced backwards into a wall.

But he emerged, grinning at Loki, who had reappeared as soon as his dopplegangers had faded away. "Now that's more like it!"

Katarina's heart sank. She did not want to accept it, but Loki was out of his league.

OoOoOoO

There was a sharp pain in Nikolai's head, and everything seemed to go blurry.

Oh no, not again. He thought in dismay. I'm going to have a dreadful headache after this is done.

Suddenly, everything sharpened, and it was as if he was seeing double, each movement of everybody else like it was duplicated, one faster than the other.

"Nikolai-Nikolai?" Alienora's voice echoed, and he saw her frown at him at two different times. "What-what...?"

"It's nothing." His voice was the only one that was stable. The cheering of the crowd made it even worse; each laugh was doubled, each clap, each shout. He gripped his head. "I'm fine."

He looked at the arena, and admitted to himself that it was pretty interesting to see things before they actually happened.

NearSighted. That's what his mother had called it. Katarina had the power to use sorcery, and he was NearSighted.

But then something happened that he didn't believe. He blinked, and then stood up, knowing he only had seconds to act, before the thing he saw became reality. His sister's name was on his lips.

"Katarina!"

OoOoOoO

She heard it right before it happened. Her name. Nikolai screaming it.

"Katarina!"

The crowd gasped as one as the giant thing came barreling in from the direction of the hunting forest, and some whispered to their neighbors, wondering if this was something King Odin had concocted to make the tournament more interesting.

But no, the expression of shock on both Thor and Loki's face disproved that as they both rolled out of the way, fight momentarily forgotten at the arrival of the beast.

Katarina watched the creature, horrified. It was a huge bear, at least thirteen feet in height. Its fur was matted and bloodstained and midnight-black, with glowing eyes as red as burning coals from a fire. Its maw was huge, with rows upon rows of jagged yellow teeth and white saliva dripping from its black, snarling lips.

She expected it to veer around, chase after the princes, but instead it kept on going straight, charging right at...

...her.

Things seemed to slow down. She could hear every thump of the bear's foot as it landed on the ground, heard every scream and gasp of the audience. She saw the bear approaching, and yet she seemed to be frozen to the ground.

It's going to kill me. The thought came very suddenly, with a sense of panic building in the back of her throat. That thing is going to kill me, and there's not a thing that I can do about it. I can't... even... move!

Instinctively, pointlessly, she raised her arms up in front of her face to protect it. The last thing she saw before she clenched her eyes shut was its raised, clawed paw and its burning eyes, glittering with hate and bloodlust.

And the last thing she thought was, I will not let it hear me screa-

The crowd screamed in horror as it heard the sound of claw ripping through flesh and quite a few ladies (and maybe a few lords) fainted in fear.

And then there was silence. Absolute silence.

OoOoOoO

Katarina didn't move, didn't even open up her eyes to see what happened. Am I dead? There is no pain, so I must be.

She felt something warm and wet drip onto her cheek, and she looked up.

What she saw made her freeze.

In front of her stood Loki- Loki- with his back to her, one arm thrown out to deflect the bear's blow (the one that was meant to be her death) and the other one thrust forward, his hand gripping the silver handle of a long knife, which was buried hilt-deep in the bear's chest. Katarina put her hand to her face and realized that it was blood on her cheek- Loki's blood. For as he tried to deflect the blow the beast's razor-sharp claws had raked his shoulder, leaving three long, deep cuts. Its talons were currently dangling over her head, dripping the Dark Prince's blood. Droplets splattered the dirt around her.

With a grunt, said prince lifted a foot and slammed it hard into the bear's chest, and it fell backwards, unmistakably dead, eyes blank. He then turned slowly around, facing the princess of Vanaheim.

"You... you..." Katarina just couldn't find the right words. Were there any "right words" for this? "How did you...?"

Loki gave her the tiniest smirk as he placed his right hand over his heart and bowed slightly before straightening up again.

And at that moment, Katarina didn't really care that the entire crowd was silent. She didn't really care that a thousand eyes were glued on the two. She didn't even care that Prince Thor of Asgard stood only a couple yards away, staring.

She stood up, standing on the tips of her toes, and kissed him, right on the cheek.

OoOoOoO

He hadn't thought she would actually do it. He thought, as she stood up, that she was going to lean forward, but then pause, smirk, and pull away, whispering her thanks in his ear. But no, she didn't.

It was very quiet at first. But then there was the softest sound from a corner of the arena, and that sound was joined by others until it was a rising crescendo of noise.

Applause. They were applauding the Dark Prince of Asgard.

At first, Loki couldn't believe it. He was smiling like an idiot, and Katarina was blushing but smiling as well, and the people of the Nine Realms were applauding him.

And then he saw Thor, thunderstruck (if you'll excuse the pun), frozen. And he couldn't help it.

He started to laugh.

A/N: Be truthful. Who was expecting that?

Yay! No victor! The reason?

A) I thought that Thor should win because he's technically more powerful than Loki, especially Pre-Thor.

B) I also thought that Loki should win because he's the main character for this and he's motivated by Katarina's promise.

I couldn't decide, so I just thought to myself, "Okay, neither of them will win. Something will disrupt the match." And that got me thinking of bears, for some reason.

Speaking of bears, anyone can guess where the bear came from?

Oh, and before you get confused, let me explain it right now. Nikolai possesses a type of magic called "NearSight" where it allows him to occasionally see a few seconds into the future. This contributes to his brilliant sword fighting (seeing your opponents' moves before he makes them is quite helpful).

And yay! Katarina kept her side of the deal, but they still haven't had a proper kiss yet!

Please tell me what you thought of this chapter!

Review, favorite, follow.