a familiar glove.
The man was nothing but anger. If he were to win and become the leader of Clan Atrox, he would mold it in his image. Angry. Rude. Uncaring.
Can’t let that happen, Rann said, vowing to himself that he would win today, no matter what.
Win the fight, and then go find Gayle.
“Ready?” he asked.
Prax responded by thrusting a fist forward and sending a blast of cold, hard ice at Rann’s chest.
“I guess that’s a yes,” Rann said as he stepped aside, easily avoiding the blast, bored at the tired predictability of his opponent.
Prax didn’t believe in rules. Didn’t believe in respect or being sportsmanlike. He believed in himself, and he believed in winning. That was it. In Prax’s eyes, that’s all there was in life.
Rann believed in more. He believed in the whole over the individual, and that’s why it was imperative that he win. Prax was angry.
“It’s about time you got what you deserved,” the gray-eyed, perfectly-groomed shifter snarled as he came forward behind a blistering fusillade of ice spears.
Steam flashed as they met a wall of flame, the searing fire mixing with the ice and causing the projectiles to explode as they were superheated. Rann lost sight of his foe behind the wall of fire and billowing steam clouds, but the oncoming rush of ice was a dead giveaway.
“I’ve been waiting a long time for this,” Prax said, the voice coming from a lot closer than expected.
Rann ducked, but he was a little slow as an ice-covered fist plunged through his defensive wall of fire and connected with his jaw. Only the fact that he’d already been moving prevented Prax from almost ending the fight then and there. The blow ripped apart the skin along his jaw and sent Rann to the ground, but he didn’t lose consciousness.
His foot lashed out reflexively, and it caught Prax straight in the gut. Rann had anticipated the other shifter would want to immediately close and end the fight, but the rapidly dissipating wall of flames had left him covered just long enough to deliver the blow.
Prax shot backward, flipping over in the air and landing in a crouch. He immediately popped back to his feet and came at Rann a second time. Ice hardened into blades along his arms and flowed over his hands, turning them into mailed fists.
Flaming armor coated Rann, and he met the charge head on. His feet slapped against the bare rock as he accelerated at Prax, snarling and pulling his teeth wide.
Prax grinned and came right in.
Idiot.
Once his foe was committed, having assumed Rann was coming in for a standup fight as well, Rann dropped all pretense of it. He dropped to his knees, taking Prax out at the ankles and then popping back up to his feet as the other shifter catapulted forward, smashing his face on the ground and bouncing twice before recovering his feet.
“I’m going to kill you,” Prax hissed, spinning to face Rann once more.
“Still won’t change the fact she went home with me, not you,” Rann drawled, inciting Prax’s anger even more. “Still won’t change the fact you lost.”
That was the source of their bad blood. A competition over a woman, back when Rann had been interested in such things. He’d won. He always won. Prax had been an ass back then too, and women saw through his gentlemanly façade with ease.
Prax hadn’t taken it well. It didn’t help that Rann had gloated in front of a number of other shifters, embarrassing Prax. But he’d been a different person then.
“Fuck you,” Prax spat, and a snowstorm billowed out from his palms, obscuring Rann’s vision.
He ducked to the side, sensing more than seeing the icicle that narrowly missed his chest. A second one crashed into his side however, nearly impaling him. It pierced his skin, but Rann was already calling upon flames to protect him, and they melted it before it could dig into the muscle and organs.
Hissing in pain, he rolled far out of the way, calling upon a matching flamestorm. Yellow-orange fire filled the room with Rann as its focal point. It warred with the ice, and hot steam billowed up into the viewing chamber. There, a storm dragon flicked an idle hand, and winds swirled it up and through a hole in the cave, preventing any of the observers from being burned.
Grunting with effort, Rann thrust his fists forward, exerting pressure on Prax. He pushed the other shifter back until he was trapped against a wall, a snow