Test of Strength

“Come back here!” The voice bellowed from the fringes of the sandpit as Petra slid down the side of the ashen ravine. The sand didn’t bother her as it would bother the interloper hot on her heels, but her heart still pounded in her ears. “Get back here you coward!”

“I’m not a coward!” Petra shouted back, and then scrambled off through the sand when her voice alerted her pursuer of her location. It was a Nimare with pink hair, that much she knew, and she’d seen her around. Although, seen might be a bit of a strong word — Petra had heard her, and even so, she’d mostly been complaining about the sand and the dry air, which duh. But it was what Nimare were like, duh. Petra didn’t like the water, but no one made them come to the desert!

And well, there was this issue with Nimare, too. Petra was a stalk of a tall and gangly Saurian, with spikes in itchy places that weren’t too large but packed a punch. She was used to scuffles and sparring, but never with someone outside of her cohort; she never feared for her safety with other Saurians.

Nimare, though, Nimare were something else. She’d thought the girl was dainty, and she’d had this sort of a delicate face, even though it had been marred with a frown. Or maybe it wasn’t her face, but her pink hair that had thrown Petra off. Nothing really made her say - “Hey, we should spar!” She just thought it was a fight she’d win, especially because she’d seen the girl’s tail, too. It seemed large like it would make it difficult for someone so tall and thin to move across the sand.

And it was difficult for Nimare girl to move, but that was probably the only thing keeping Petra ahead of her. Petra was used to the dust and the sand, her scales used to the wind and the chafing. She burrowed through the sand, hoping to throw her off, and when she emerged through the dune several seconds later, she found herself falling down a steep slope. Petra tucked her tail in, but she didn’t even try to keep her limbs close to her body as she slid down the dune in a hurricane of sand particles.

Her descent was slowed by a dark spike protruding from the sand right in front of her, followed by a scaly body that was certainly more accustomed to water than to sand. The pink-haired girl flew out of the dune, inelegant and undignified, and her claws closed around Petra’s calf. Petra cried out as though her leg had been cut, and then wiggled desperately in the send as the Nimare dragged her along towards the bottom of the pit.

“Let me go!” Petra screamed as dark blue legs closed over her torso as she tried to get up, and she was unceremoniously dumped back into the desert. “You idiot, you’re supposed to play!”

“I don’t know,” the other girl said, voice heaving from the exertion, “It seemed pretty serious to me back in the camp.”

“You brute!” Petra shouted, disregarding the woman’s taunting. “I yield!”

“You yield?” The Nimare asked, pressing Petra’s face into the sand. Her hand at the back of Petra’s neck tightened instead of loosening, and Petra couldn’t keep her tail from flailing for a few seconds before the pink-haired woman straddled her and put a stop to it with her feet. Next to Petra, through the sand, a huge, almost crustacean tail lay down motionless. The spike was almost as large as Petra’s forearm. Saurian spikes didn’t make her nervous, they never did, but this one made an uncomfortable feeling settle in the pit of her stomach. It looked wrong. Foreign. “Just like that?”

“You win, okay? What do you want?” She asked, starting to sweat a little from anxiety. What if wasn’t just playing? If it was for real, and she finally bit off more than she could chew?

“Just playing,” the Nimare said. “No funny business when I let you go, okay?” And then, the pressure on Petra’s nape lessened and the weight of the other woman disappeared. “I’m Nanshe.”

Nahn-she. Petra tried the name out first, then got up, spitting sand.

“Petra, that’s me,” she said while getting up and when she deemed that Nanshe wouldn’t be a further threat, she flopped down on the sand, half-sitting against the slope. “Thanks for the spar!”

“It’s not a spar if it’s one-sided,” Nanshe said and then spawled herself down on the sand next to Petra. Her skin, also scaly, was clammy and cold to the touch. Petra was dying to know whether it was sweat, or if Nimare were just always oozing sea from their pores. It seemed a little rude to ask. “You weren’t supposed to run.”

“You seemed a little aggressive, didn’t you?” Petra asked rhetorically.

“Maybe,” Nanshe said, “You can teach me more about your rules back at your camp?”

Petra stood there under the sweltering sun, still looking at that strange dark green tail, at those forearms and scales so similar to her own and yet so different. Nanshe was slim and tall, but only when she was motionless did Petra realise that she looked a little rugged too.

“Sure,” she said, “I’ll teach you our ways. I kinda want to know more about you too.”

“It’s a deal,” Nanshe said, smiling amicably, and that was that.