Hiei watched Nishi that day and next, surprised at home willing she was to forgive the detective so easily. It gave him own sense of hope in that, even though he was still annoyed that the detective let the uncle put her through all that.
They did have the tournament the king decided to put on in Gandara, as befitting a distraction as their could be. The king had anyone who wanted to fight down in the tiny fitting pit the cousin had made for the beauty as a wedding gift back when they were married. She loved to fight, being a knight. She was raising their only son to be a knight like her one day.
The beauty was one of the fighters down in the pit with Hiei. Along with the king, the prince, Nishi, the twins, the stranger, the fox, the detective, the oaf, and a few other elves Hiei was unsure of their names. Anyone else with them on progress was in the stands to watch, along with folk from the city.
The king broke down the rules for them. One match between two fighters each. Everyone would draw a coin out of the bag. Half the coins had numbers on them, while the other half of the coins had no marks on them, wilds. Those with numbers would pair up to battle, like numbers one and two, three and four, etc. Those with wild could trade out for someone else in an assigned match. So if the detective had one, the fox had two, and the stranger had a wild, then the stranger could take the fox's number two coin in order to fight with the detective. If traded out by other another opponent, you could not return to a previous potential opponent if other fighters were an option. They could keep trading until the next set ready went up to fight. If two wilds decided to, they could also pair up to fight at the end of the line. Apparently this was a tournament the king liked to do with his knights from time to time to build morale and have fun.
The only rules that were different today is the king determined he got coin one, his son the prince, coin two, and the twins coin three and four. No one was allowed to exchange with the four of them. Everyone else in the fights was fair game.
Hiei's coin had number seven. Nishi came over to him, showing him her coin with a wild on it. When the elvish fighter with the eight coin stepped up to the two of them, Nishi gave Hiei a fierce smirk, taking the number eight coin from the elvish fighter. She stood in line with him while they watched the king and prince fight. While he was excited at the idea to fight Nishi once again, he felt disappointed that he could not fight a fresh opponent.
The king and the prince stepped up into the circle of stone that was the arena. The prince's hair shown, even from a distance, like spun sunlight. He summoned up a bow from his own energy in his hand, an arrow of the same shimmer in his other hand. The king stood across from him, his own conjured up energy bow and arrow. A bit like father, like son by the looks of it. Both of them looked up at the queen sitting in the stands, with the cousin next to her, his and the beauty's son sitting beside him. The queen brought her hands together, and clapped once.
The prince fired first. He aimed and fired an arrow at the king. The arrow spun through the air, but the king dodged it at the last second. He then fired his own arrow at the prince mid roll. The prince dodged, but rolled in a predictable direction. The king caught onto it, sending an arrow firing towards where the prince halted. The well aimed arrow sliced through the air, skinning the prince on the outside of his shoulder. He hissed, looking annoyed at his father. The prince rolled to his feet, getting up and running towards the king recklessly. He shot a series of arrows as he ran, each one the king dodged, two looked like bare misses.
When the prince got close enough to the king, he summoned away his bow and arrows, preferring to go barehanded and to turn this into a fist fight. The prince punched at the king, keeping at a close distance to the king. The fists being thrown were well crafted, well aimed, both between the prince and the king, but the king had the advantage. It was mostly the king looking like he was training the prince in a fist fight now, pushing the younger one to show off his strength and skill.
Eventually the king seemed to grow bored though. He overpowered the the prince, taking him down to the ground, and pinning him there with a knee in his lower back until the prince gave in.
The prince looked flustered when he gave in and the king hauled him up to his feet, and brushing off his back. The king let loose a deep, rolling laugh, speaking quietly to the prince as they left the arena. From the distance, Hiei heard his girl laugh, mutter something that sounded a lot like, "vain boy."
"Next!" the king barked, nodding over at the twins. Hiei noticed his eyes were only on his girl though.
The twins made their way into the arena, but then things got interesting. The detective came up to Nishi, tapping her on the shoulder. She looked up at him, confused. Then he said, "tag out," holding up his wild coin. He reached down, taking the number eight coin out of her hand. "I want a rematch," the detective said to Hiei. To Nishi, he said, "so move over. Thems the rules." He gave her a playful shove out of the line up.
Hiei heard a few of those around them laugh at that. Nishi scowled at the detective, but stepped away. She looked down the line debating where she wanted to go to fight. Hiei watched her go two pairs back, taking a coin from an elvish woman with wild, dirty blonde hair. She stepped up to fight the stranger.
Hiei turned back to watch the fight between the twins about to take place. The two of them stood in the center of the arena. The queen clapped. Her boy knelt down to his girl, whispering something in her ear. Whatever he said, put a large smile across her face. She turned around, half jumping, half running a few feet away from him.
His girl summoned up her fire dragon around her neck. Hiei could sense, almost feel the heat radiating off of it. He could smell the slight scent of singed hair coming from her. Hiei looked over at her boy. He had his ice dragon hanging over his neck, and dangling around his torso. Hiei clicked his teeth. Nishi had told both of them not to use their dragons. Her boy seemed to have other ideas.
His girl gave a loud shriek, inflaming her dragon's powers, blazing the air around her. Izo did the same with his ice dragon, only this time, freezing the air around him. Their energies surrounded them, a red sphere and a light blue sphere. When the spheres grew bigger, the rubbed against each other. Where they came in contact, sparks danced. His girl pushed her sphere to get bigger, colliding with her boy's sphere. Then her boy grew his sphere, pressing against his girl's sphere. It created a thunderous explosion.
Hiei shielded his eyes, waiting for the light and sound to fade. When they did, he opened his eyes, blinking at cratered dent left in the center of the arena. Neither child was anywhere to be seen. He felt panic set in, but then heard two different sets of laughter.
To his left, he saw his girl, half laying, half sitting up by the wall. She was laughing loudly and joyfully. To the right, her boy was staggering to his knees, with a bits of dust and rubble from the dent he made in the wall behind them. He was smirking to himself, loosing on a small burst of laughter.
His girl was up on her feet, running towards the arena. Her boy looked surprised at her, and followed suit. His girl was faster, being smaller in stature, climbing into arena first of the two of them. Her boy did it more gracefully though. Once in the arena, she ran over to him, skidding to a halt in front of him, toe to toe.
Her boy smirked down at her. "No weapons?" he asked her, barely loudly enough for Hiei to hear. "No energy? No dragons? Just fists?"
She smiled up at him, nodding her head vigorously. His girl attacked first, fighting between the two of them. Each of them fought as they had been trained, to use their different sizes to their advantages. His girl tried to stayed close and tight in the fight, using her knees and elbows. Her boy tried to keep his distances, moving away from her to use the length of his arms and legs to give him strength to his punches and kicks.
"Damn it," Hiei swore under his breath.
Her boy gained distance from his girl, then swung a sharp right hook at her. It came in contact with the side of his girl's head. Her head turned from the contact, making her stagger and then fall down. She pushed herself up sideways, arms shaking as the held her upper body off the ground. Her legs laid together beneath her. She shifted her body, pushing and pulling herself to get on her elbows and knees. She replaced her elbows with her hands. She did the same with one of knees with her foot, but the way she placed her foot was all wrong. It crossed over to the other side of her body. When she went to bring her other foot up, her ankles tangled, bringing her back down to her hands and knees.
"That's match!" the king roared out his ruling.
"No," his girl pouted.
Her boy stepped over to her, helping her up. Silently, he raised his hand over where he had struck her, healing her. Once he finished healing her, she shoved him away ruefully. She jumped out of the arena, storming off. Her boy followed suit.
Hiei did not move, but relayed to his girl, 'you stay with your brother and go to the stands, or else you will wish you had.' He stayed in her mind long enough to see she listened begrudgingly to him. She and her boy made their way to the stands.
Then Hiei looked up, coming back into focus with the area around him. The next pair was up in front of him, starting their fight. Yet the detective was no longer standing next to him. It was elf with wild blonde hair. The wild elf smirked at him, introducing herself as Aiko.