Frisson

Sammy felt a frisson rush down her spine as she prepared for the physical trial. She couldn't believe the faith Prince Anthony had in her. Well actually he was King Anthony, now. She had to keep reminding herself of that fact. If it wasn’t so obvious that King Anthony already had a mate in mind, she and many of the other cats would have thrown themselves at King Anthony to try and woo him.

She hadn’t, yet, been born when Prince Anthony made the decision to go to the human dimension, but she couldn’t help feeling like it had been a loss for the cat kingdom as he was clearly handsome and knew how to handle himself well. Though, of course, if he’d stayed here he would have been massacred with the others, so perhaps it was better that he’d gone to the human kingdom. She knew he was going to leave behind a number of broken hearts when he returned to the human dimension.

Sammy shook her head to clear the unnecessary thoughts. She knew that they were just there as a distraction to cover her worry over the trials. She couldn't believe she was doing this. She only hoped she was as good as King Anthony believed.

She had on her most utilitarian outfit not wanting to chance anything getting caught during the battle. Their battlefield rather than being a wide open field was to start in the library and points would be deducted for every book destroyed. Then after 30 minutes they were to move the fight through the castle and to the woods fighting the whole way. Again points would be deducted for any damage to the castle.

They were not allowed any weapons to start with, but could make weapons out of anything they found or could make. Rupert set them each up in a corner of the huge library. There were book cases randomly all over the place as well as a number of chairs and tables for reading purposes scattered throughout the library. Once he’d positioned them appropriately, he then started counting to three. He waved a flag on three and then moved out of the way so as to avoid getting caught in the battle.

The guardsman knowing that a weapon could often make the difference between life and death immediately grabbed a round table to use as a shield and double as a bashing weapon. He wanted a better weapon, but the library was not the best place to find weapons. Sammy meanwhile trusted her flexibility to help her against any weapon and used the time the guardsman took finding a weapon/shield to recon the library and blend into the background.

The guardsman looked in the direction that Sammy had started and was surprised to find that Sammy was nowhere to be found. He quickly looked around and tried to find Sammy, but she no longer seemed to be in the room. He brought up his table shield just in case Sammy was still around somewhere. However, the guardsman had forgotten to look up. Sammy crept silently along the ceiling until she was directly above the guardsmen and she immediately dropped down punching her legs out against the table knocking it away from the guardsman as she landed on top of him scratching him pretty good.

The guardsman recovered quickly defaulting to his hand to hand and fighting back. Soon they were scratching each other all over the place as they exchanged blows and blocks and demonstrated their martial arts prowess. Realizing that he wouldn’t be able to win if he kept it fair, the guardsman switched to guerrilla style warfare and started grabbing books and throwing them at Sammy forcing her to choose between protecting herself and protecting the books.

Sammy caught the books as they came at her setting them down on a chair to deal with later in an attempt to protect the books while still preventing injury to herself. The guardsman wasn’t about to give up though and he tore into anything he could reach flinging it at Sammy. Sammy couldn’t save the parts that he tore up, but she made sure to save as much as she could as she launched herself at the guardsman to prevent him from using further ammunition and doing further damage.

The guardsman dodged her lunge as he moved out of the library through the castle and towards the wood. Sammy took off after him gracefully moving through the castle as if she’d lived there all her life. By the time they reached the woods, Sammy had concocted a plan in her head. She immediately put it into action chasing the guardsman up a tree and cornering him in the tree roaring her head off.

King Anthony clapped, impressed despite himself. He could tell the guardsman had gone easy on her, but she’d still done very well. Tony almost wanted to battle her himself. She seemed very adaptable on the battlefield and that was definitely a strength that would bode well for a Prince or Princess as the case may be.