I said I'd post this immediately after the previous chapter... but I didn't.
Sorry about that guys. On the plus side this story got SEVEN views in between chapter one and my next meeting with a computer screen. A bunch of offended/puzzled or slightly amused readers within four hours of Chapter One is a pretty good start! Thanks to all of you for reading!
Story now!
Cynder and Imperia had arrived at Warfang not long after the sun had set. Cynder had received a practical lesson in wind control as the rain began to fall and the storm to roll in; the wind ability to create a bubble of air free of rain, hail and other obstructions had certainly made the flight easier.
Warfang looked more foreboding than Cynder remembered from her last visit. The high city walls seemed sinister in the dim light, water streamed through the gutters, lightning silhouetted the city towers and Cynder could feel each rolling wave of thunder make a distinctive echo off the hard stone.
A larger number of guard dragons watched the land entrances to the city then Cynder remembered and Imperia had needed to identify herself to another guard before the two dragons had been allowed inside Warfang proper. Aside from this additional security Cynder had seen no particular disasters. Cynder slept in Imperia's chambers, but with the storm neither dragon slept very well.
"There's a disaster in Warfang? Is it the breakfast?" Cynder teased the next morning. The breakfast wasn't really all that bad, but there wasn't enough for two dragons, and Cynder had a surprisingly big appetite for her slender figure. Imperia had breakfast delivered to her tower chambers, but only breakfast for one dragon.
"Surely you're used to going hungry? Food is scarce on the borders of civilization" Imperia said.
"City dragons like to say that." Cynder mused "The truth is that there's lots of food in the wilderness… For any dragon who's good enough to find it." Cynder smiled.
"Wild food certainly agrees with you. And you've done well to stay presentable."
"What do you mean?"
"Cynder, you look very fetching."
"Oh, um, thankyou... You know it's not that hard to get by in the wild, I mean, a dragon can fly faster and hit harder than most of the creatures out there, also magic really helps in hunting. There are plenty of waterfalls to bathe under, so keeping clean is no problem."
"I think I prefer the city: conversation, heated baths, the library, students to teach. I'm not an outdoors dragon."
"Spyro…" Cynder quietly added the name to Imperia's list.
"Sorry? I missed that." Cynder thought for a moment before deciding to hurry the conversation along, this chatting stuff could take all day.
"Where's Spyro? Does he know I'm here?"
"No, but he-"
"But he wanted me to come?" Cynder pressed, Imperia hesitated.
"I know he'll be-"
Cynder's voice took on a steely tone. "Imperia please, don't evade my questions. Explain why you dragged me back here, quickly."
"Quickly? Fine then. In the Colosseum today, Spyro will fight to the death."
Spyro the purple dragon, hero of dragonkind, the savior of the entire world, stood at the center of the Colosseum, less than a hundred metres from where Cynder sat in the stands. He had grown like she had, Spyro was tall, lean and strong, and he looked proud and quietly confident. He had grown more handsome too, Cynder couldn't help thinking.
Even from her seat in the vast stands and surrounded by dragons, Cynder could practically sense the power within Spyro. He faced the huge Iron Gate patiently, waiting for it to open. A sound from behind that gate made him tilt his head, Cynder's heart skipped a beat, just for a moment Spyro looked shockingly like Malefor, the Dark Master, the long dead evil purple dragon. Nobody else seemed to see it, few people had ever seen Malefor and lived after all. The moment passed and Cynder looked around the Colosseum.
The crowd was mostly moles; Half of Warfang had turned out to watch the dragonfight, perhaps the only dragonfight some of them would ever see. They were packed tight and filled nearly three quarters the stands. The dragons, being much larger than the moles, took more space, and were fewer, but dragons had never been hugely numerous. Cynder noted that the moles had pressed away from a small contingent of dragons, who in turn were on the opposite side of the arena to the main group of dragons, they looked unfriendly. Cynder turned to Imperia, who was seated next to her.
"Who is Spyro fighting?"
Imperia, never content with a name when a history lesson would suffice, briefly explained what was going on and why. Cynder, of course, had been away and didn't know what was happening.
"Long ago dragon society was arranged differently, dragons grouped together according to skills. These were the Artisans, The dream catchers; they were weird ones, there were the beast makers and so on. Many of these dragon factions became unnecessary as time went on, eventually dragon society was re-organised into the elemental structure of today.
"The Peacekeepers were caught up in a battle with the Old Fire Dragons and eventually lost their homes and their lives. Cliff town, city of the Peacekeepers, has been under Old Fire control ever since. The city was renamed Shattershelf. It has been rebuilt into an impenetrable fortress; it has never been taken by an enemy, or even successfully infiltrated.
"We never proved that the Shattershelf dragons gave aid to The Apes on the night of the dragon temple raid, when your egg was captured by the Dark Master, but the Old Fire Dragons had long held a truce with our enemy. After Malefor was defeated we believe that their city was practically undamaged. The Fire dragons struck us in the first year after that, and dragonkind has been at war ever since."
Cynder absorbed this information, it didn't answer her question but it was interesting.
"How has the war gone? And who is Spyro fighting?"
"The actual war has stalled; dragon war usually has few casualties. As you know dragons can take an extraordinary amount of punishment with little permanent damage, or scales deflect most physical attacks and our bones are strong enough to withstand even direct hits from giant monsters like The Golem. As the dragon fighters on each side are evenly matched nobody has been able to gain the advantage. Only Ignitus, being the fire guardian, commanded the respect needed to try diplomacy, when he died we lost our best chance of stopping this war. Flare, the new fire guardian, is skilled enough-
Imperia stopped and laughed slightly.
"Okay she's amazing actually and I'm a huge fan of hers, but she hasn't even been given a chance to parlay with the Fire. The leader of the fire dragons claimed he was insulted by her attempt and invited her or her champion to a fight to the death. Spyro volunteered himself to face the dragon leader in combat."
"Spyro would never let another dragon die here."
"No, Spyro is famous for never hiding from a fight, and he's legendary because he always wins."
"That sounds like Spyro."
"Spyro has become truly powerful, the strength of a purple dragon is remarkable and he isn't even fully grown yet. The bad news is that he's up against one of the only dragons who may be powerful enough to beat him."
"Who is this dragon? And why, if he has a whole army of possible champions, will he fight Spyro himself?"
"His name is Magmar, he is the dragon who fought in the Ice and Fire wars for fifty years, after they had gone on for two hundred, and ended them with fire's victory, some say singlehandedly. He's one of the only dragons to ever reach mastery of two elemental powers. His earth element is the result of pure determination, but not his most dangerous. He is a lethal close combat fighter and he is perhaps the greatest fire dragon we've seen in a hundred years. Easily the equal of Ignitus."
"Spyro has four elements." Cynder observed, as a purple dragon he could master Earth, Ice, Fire and Lightning. Cynder had four elements as well, Shadow, Poison, Wind and Fear.
"You have four elements also, but you two are unique. It takes most dragons decades to even use basic elemental techniques from another element. I'm learning to use ice, but it's just as hard as I thought it would be."
A horn sounded. An hourglass turned, marking the start of the match.
The gate opened.
It opened in a suitably dramatic manner. The gate rose with a groan and a rattling of huge chains. From the darkness a huge red dragon emerged. Magmar was easily twice Spyro's size, and clad in armour of jagged black metal. Compared to him Spyro looked… heroic.
Cynder could think of no better word; they had faced bigger than this dragon, the Golem of the deep earth for example. She felt confident Spyro had a chance here. Her confidence took a blow, however, when she saw the dragon's eyes. They were the eyes of a killer, a trained, experienced, cold hearted killer.
The two dragons wasted no time on threats or speeches, the crowd grew silent. Magmar just stalked toward Spyro, meaning to crush the smaller dragon in his claws. Spyro seemed totally unfazed by the threat coming for him, but Cynder knew he was doing what she in the stands was doing too, looking for weaknesses in that terrifying spiked armour. She saw only the smallest places in which to attack; she could perhaps slip a poison strike onto Magmar's foreleg, or his eyes, but a dragon like him would be ready for that, and Spyro had no poison anyway.
Magmar covered the final distance to Spyro in an explosive rush, but the crowd stared as Spyro leapt straight through the mighty dragon's attack and struck a huge blow on his armoured skull. The crowd roared. Cynder actually felt the concussion of the blow in the wind, from the stands, an attack like that could fell a troll. Magmar's burning eyes never left Spyro's. The Fire Lord didn't even seem to notice the impact. Spyro landed some distance away and looked back at him defiantly, prepared for the next attack.
Again Magmar walked straight up to Spyro and raised a claw. Spyro repeated his earlier move, evading the attack and going straight for his opponent's head, this time however, Magmar revealed his true speed, his tail, spiked, armoured and lethal, missed Spyro by millimetres as the purple dragon twisted out of the way, but he moved directly into Magmar's well-timed punch. There was a solid thwack and Spyro lost his balance. Magmar immediately grabbed him and wrenched.
There was a crack.
Cynder had a miniature heart attack.
Spyro exploded.
The dragons were hurled apart; Magmar suffered far more of the impact, and was thrown against the stadium wall so hard as to break it. Spyro touched down after his blazing comet dash and turned quickly back to face his opponent. The crowd roared.
The armour on Magmar's claws was actually melted, the metal scarred by the heat, but the dragon himself was only bruised, and growing angry.
Spyro had come out second best from the encounter, his foreleg was twisted at an unnatural angle, it made Cynder feel sick to look at, and he couldn't put weight on it. The crowd grew uncertain, Spyro flexed to determine the damage, and then he made a sudden movement and howled in pain as he popped his dislocated bone back into place. Someone in the crowd threw up.
Magmar had encountered his own problem, some of the complicated plate joints on his back armour had been bent out of shape. He ripped a large section of it off furiously and threw it on the ground. He looked up and saw Spyro carefully stand on his injured leg. Both dragons re-appraised their opponent, and then Magmar used his own comet dash.
Cynder stared; she hadn't known the fire element was capable of such raw power. Magmar crossed the distance between the dragons in an eye blink; Spyro used earth to defend himself, raising a precipice of stone and soil in Magmar's way. It meant nothing to the master fire dragon; He could cut through solid stone like fresh snow.
The earth wall shattered like glass, some of it turned into glass, Magmar's comet dash was that hot. At the final moment Magmar used a flourish of magic that Cynder hadn't even known was possible, even as he hurled into Spyro at brutal speed The Fire dragon instantaneously converted all of his power into a critical range explosion.
Cynder felt power humming inside her body. The world turned purple and time slowed to a crawl. Spyro had used Dragon Time, a power that was unique to the purple dragons. Cynder had gone through the cruellest training imaginable to learn to use this ability after Spyro had come to the attention of Malefor. Not that her training had ever meant anything until now, Spyro had defeated her evil self anyway, but she alone saw what happened next.
Even with Dragon Time Spyro used only seconds to react to the attack, his earth boulder would be no defence at all, but it seemed like his only option. Had he used it Spyro would have been blasted into the walls of the Arena with bone breaking force, had he not used it Spyro would have been blown into shreds by an attack like that. What he did was either madness or genius, and had nothing to do with earth at all. Spyro used his Ice storm attack, but not on himself, instead he targeted Magmar's explosion.
Time restarted.
The Explosion unmade itself and compressed into an orb of pure power. Ice, steam and fire warred for control within the fragile bounds of Spyro and Magmar's magic. Both dragons realised at the same time that they were standing next to a disaster waiting to happen, Spyro hurled himself backwards and dove for cover. Magmar activated his earth boulder just in time, as the bubble of elemental power exploded the two dragons were thrown to opposite sides of the arena.
Spyro rose and shook off the damage, then he turned an icy gze upon his enemy. Magmar's entire body was beginning to glow with heat, waves of bloodthirsty anger radiated from him. The huge dragon was spitting molten fire
Spyro's first step was unsteady, his second step wasn't.
"Chill out." He muttered and he took a deep breath and exhaled a blizzard.
Visibility dropped to nearly zero, Cynder could see neither Spyro nor Magmar, but the blizzard was carefully contained in the arena and did not rise out of it. Cynder admired Spyro's control. Fire split the storm, but Spyro's ice closed around it and choked it.
"This is one of Spyro's best techniques." Imperia whispered. "Massive area of effect damage and stunning after effects, it's unique to him, using ice an-"
The entire snow cloud lit up blindingly, elemental lightning coursed through every snowflake and illuminated the stadium brilliantly. Inside the lightning storm Magmar howled in pain. Cynder was Impressed, and also grateful that the blizzard had not extended up into the crowd and gotten her electrocuted.
The heat turned the ice to steam and when the steam cleared Spyro stood tall and proud. The crowd erupted into cheers, only Cynder seemed to realize that Spyro was still in danger.
"Spyro! Behind you!" She cried, Spyro's head jerked up at the sound of her voice and then he turned and Magmar rose from out of the ground and Spyro couldn't dodge the attack and that spiked terrible tail caught Spyro full on, sending him crashing down.
Cynder threw caution to the winds and began screaming instructions and encouragement to Spyro. Imperia had to physically restrain her from trying to join the fight.
Magmar was smoking in a manner a fire dragon probably shouldn't, and he limped severely on his rear leg. His armour was charred and practically ruined, but he was still winning. The dragon looked across the crowd, daring them to challenge him. Terrified silence filled the stands, Cynder didn't care all her minds was focused on Spyro's form, trying to get up.
Those burning eyes fixed on Cynder, the fire dragon looked at her and something like recognition showed in Magmar's gaze, it was followed by pure overwhelming hatred. It took all of Imperia's strength to hold Cynder down, but she managed it and Cynder could only watch as Magmar slowly turned his back on her and limped over to Spyro. Spyro looked at him as he approached; the red dragon said something quietly to Spyro, Cynder felt sure it had to do with her.
For a moment there was a standoff, than both dragons activated comet dash and hurtled together.
One might have expected an explosion, and had two dragons using the fire technique actually met in the centre of the arena, one would certainly have witnessed an explosion, but Spyro was a purple dragon, and he understood the elements in a way no mere fire dragon ever could.
Magmar had outcompeted Spyro in melee, and he did have more experience and power. Had he maintained his battering he may have even overwhelmed the smaller dragon. Magmar was devastating with his fire attacks. Spyro, however, was completely in a league of his own; his elemental combination of versatility and control left even the strongest dragon completely and laughably outclassed. Spyro had been doing nothing but train for nearly three years, and the results were in.
Magmar didn't understand why his comet dash turned to smoke, he had no idea that Spyro had used his ice, which was after all the easiest element with which to douse fire, to foul up and shut off Magmar's magic. Enlightenment didn't come for the red when Spyro's intact comet dash crashed into him, but what did come were bright dancing lights of a starry persuasion, which was small consolation to the confused and dazed dragon. Spyro promptly doused his fallen foe in a large snowdrift. Then he filled that with lightning to make sure he stayed down.
The crowd erupted in cheering. Imperia whooped in celebration, and then Cynder broke free from her and threw herself into the arena.
"Spyro!" She cried, running toward him as fast as she could.
"Cynder?" Spyro looked around, saw her "Cynder!" he exclaimed. He limped a step, than ran straight to her.
The crowd grew completely silent as the two dragons embraced, but neither dragon knew anything of the world beyond the two of them.
Cynder wouldn't have recognized one mole among a crowd of thousands. All moles looked alike really, but this particular mole was one of a few that Cynder and Spyro had saved from a fire, on the day that Malefor had tried to invade Warfang some three years ago. The mole recognized Cynder, and after a moment of trying to process what was going on he began to cheer and cheer wildly. For a moment he cheered alone, then Imperia on the stands joined him, and in moments the entire crowd was chanting its approval for the reunited dragons and for Spyro's victory.
Imperia laughed, but she wasn't heard in the general din. Things could hardly have worked out better for her.
That's right: A fight to the death where nobody dies. Welcome to Chapter Two.
Oh, I nearly forgot something: A Disclaimer- I don't own any rights to Spyro. If I did then there would be more Spyro.
Does Spyro seem powerful enough? If he doesn't seem a little bit OP (OverPowered, it's a gaming term) then I haven't made him awesome enough. Feel free to use your imagination to tone Spyro's awesomeness up by about 15% if you want to.
How powerful should Cynder be? Was the fight okay? Do my Author's notes suck? Is any of this making sense at all?
Thanks for reading. Please leave a review, follow this story for more rapid updates (I promise), PM me with comments and ideas (or just for conversation with a Spyro fan)
"I think, therefore I am"
-4Dragons