A bloody kitchen knife in my hand, I stumbled out of the mansion into the moonlight lit garden. A few torches were standing where the gallow once stood, illuminating the arena where Markus and I were supposed to fight. While blood dripped down from the knife, I hurried towards Arthur and Markus, frustrated by my clothing with frills everywhere. As soon as Markus spotted me, he drew his blade while Arthur couldn’t hold back a grin. Everything was his fault and he knew it.

“How am I supposed to walk in these shitty shoes? It is certainly great how much taller I am, but I seriously don’t understand the tactical advantage of stumbling on the battlefield. How is anyone supposed to fight in these?” I pointed down to my white shoes which kind I never saw before. Just walking in them made me incredibly uncomfortable.

“Those are high heels, mostly meant for dancing. You are neither supposed to fight in them nor walk on gravel with them.” With a smug grin, he explained these weird shoes to me while I reached down and threw both of them a few metres to my side. With only my white socks between the stones and my foot, it felt a lot better.

“And what´s up with this dress? Why is it so long?” This abomination was the next item on my list. First of all, it was completely white. And I hated white. The only good thing with this dress was the ability to soak up blood which it certainly already did in the chest area.

“I told the maid to bring you traditional White´s clothing. I meant the colour scheme, while she apparently thought of something else entirely.” Furious, I cut off the lower part of my dress. With my newfound knee freedom, I felt a lot better once again. At least I had a slightly red hem now. “If I may inquire, what´s up with the kitchen knife?”

“I need a weapon to fight him, don’t I?” Obviously, I wouldn’t go to a fight without any weapons if I could. The kitchen knife was the only weapon I could find and so I brought it with me.

“I meant the blood.” I hoped that Arthur wouldn’t talk about it. It should have been obvious what happened to me. The bloody patch at my chest should help to figure everything out. Yeah, I stabbed myself while falling down the stairs. Damn shoes.

“Let´s not talk about it.” I coughed in my hand and tried to switch topics rather swiftly. “Anyway. How are we going to fight? Till death parts us?” Markus raised an eyebrow but finally seethed his sword again. Arthur on the other hand squinted his eyes as if he became suspicious of something.

“It will be a dance battle.” Involuntarily, my chin fell downwards. This couldn’t be true, could it? Well, he did tell me that the shoes were meant for dancing, but … yeah. No.

“You got to be kidding me.” I said dumbfounded.

“Yeah. I am. But you believed me for a second, didn’t you? Where are you from that you generally know what a challenge means, yet cannot tell how it is done?” Where was that coming from all of a sudden? Nobody asked me such things until now and so I firmly believed that Aska solved these issues already which this dumb prophecy Arthur told me about. For a second, I hesitated what to say until I noticed that answering truthfully wasn’t necessarily detrimental.

“Purgatory.” Laughter erupted from both of them while could only shrug my shoulders. It wasn’t my problem that they didn’t believe me.

“That was a good joke.” Was it? Why was it a joke in the first place? I certainly wanted to inquire more, but that would probably only pique their interest and would be incredibly dumb if I could just read about it. As such, I let it go and listened to how Arthur went on. “I won´t complain if you want to hide your past as long as you serve me well. With that in mind, how about we start?”

Markus went over to a bench, picked up two wooden swords and threw one over to me. I caught it easily and immediately started to familiarize myself with it. It was a little long for me, but otherwise, it was a fairly normal wooden training sword. The edges were dull, the tip rounded and it felt rather light. Markus had the same sword and was currently in the process of splashing water on his hands. Once again, I noticed that I knew absolutely nothing about life outside purgatory. Yes, I did read a lot of books, but not that many about the culture and the antics of soldiers or nobles.

“You will fight a best of three. Everything is allowed, as long as it is non-lethal. Stepping out of the drawn circle means a loss. You can forfeit at any point during the match by tapping the ground three times. I will be the referee.”

I smiled as it was nearly perfect for what I needed to do. I wanted to win, but in a way that wouldn’t antagonize Markus any further. And yet, it was also a big guessing game. I couldn’t hold back too much right from the get-go. If I fought too badly in the beginning, Arthur would get suspicious of my prowess which I seriously didn’t need.

As such, I stepped into the ring with an opening move already in mind. The sword rested comfortably in my left hand as Markus followed suit on the other side. At first, we hungrily circled around each other, waiting for an opening that never came. Halfheartedly, I tried some feints, but he didn’t fall for them at all. He did move his sword in the optimal position to defend but didn’t forget other places I could attack. He obviously tried the same and my answer was just stepping out of his range. It was more tiresome, but stamina wise, I should have the upper hand.

“Are you afraid of hitting a girl or why are your so hesitant?” Purposefully, I provoked him which he sadly didn’t fall for. It was as if he was a completely different person while fighting. No more was the drunkard who magically conjured wine out of nowhere. He was replaced by a fierce, intensely focused warrior. And yet, I still wanted to see if I could make him angry. “Chall-“

My provocation was interrupted by a sword strike from the right, aiming directly at my belly. He used my slight slip in concentration to surprise me, which was certainly an admirable feat. And yet, I obviously expected that as I usually fought even dirtier.

Just barely, I stepped back and evaded the strike. As soon as the blade passed my belly, I stepped forwards once again and tried to strike at his sword which was just tracing back the movements it made earlier. He didn’t anticipate this move at all, mostly because it is kind of impossible to pull off if one holds the sword in the same hand as the opponent

He was at a disadvantage, he knew that. Both forces, the force from trying to swipe at me, and the force I exerted to push his sword further to his left, would make it very difficult for him to parry my sword strike. It would probably put him out of balance if he tried which I could use to my advantage. Markus was quick to react by stepping backwards though. It was the only possible way out of this situation for him, except striking me with his left fist. And yet, I didn’t expect him to counterattack me this way. He was used to sharp swords and certainly wary about hitting me barehanded while my sword was in the way. As such, he would step back.

As I correctly anticipated this, I was too close by for him to regain the upper hand. He barely reacted as I changed the course of my sword to strike at him instead of his sword by blocking it with the meagre strength he could exert in his awkward position where his sword was so far on the left and he just stepped backwards. Instead of pushing further against his block, I let go of the handle and caught it with my right hand in an instant.

He was just a millisecond or so short of reacting. I balled my left hand into a fist and swung it upwards, aiming directly at his chin. I stopped just before I hit it and looked over to Arthur.

“Win for Lucinda.” I directly turned around and went back to my starting position while thinking about the next round. I was fairly certain how capable Markus was and could plan my loss now.

“Try to win next time.” I once again provoked him while he splashed another round of water on his hands. It was an interesting ritual, although I would never volunteer to follow it myself. I waited for him to step inside the ring for only a few seconds.

The second round began just as the first one. We barely tried to attack each other for the first few minutes, but rather tested out the opponents' reactions a second time. This time, I held the sword in my right hand, aiming to confuse him even more.

Now, it was me who attacked first. I struck from the right to the left, aiming upwards to this chest. Naturally, he blocked it but behaved in a rather unexpected way afterwards. He let go of his sword and grabbed the blade of mine afterwards. This wasn’t a sword fight to begin with, was it?

Surprised by his action, I still held onto it which enabled him to pull me towards him. I did the same mistake he did in this round. I failed to realize that I didn’t hold a normal sword in my hand, but rather something akin to a stick. I immediately let go of it, but the mistake was already done. A fist was approaching my belly rather fast and I was unable to block it if I didn’t want to stand out here. As such, I rather used my momentum and closed the gap between us even more and twisted my body slightly. His fist painfully hit my unprotected side while my shoulder rammed into his belly. His strike was certainly a lot more impactful, but I did manage to close the gap for a second.

He didn’t want that to happen though. He instantly stepped backwards, fists in front of his face. I followed suit but wasn’t ready to change my fighting style yet. Instead, I eyed his sword that laid right next to me and carefully watched every move Markus made. He was waiting for something. It was as if he wanted to fight me while I was in the process of picking up the sword. I had to lose this round, but not like this. Instead of just picking it up, I would just retreat once I grabbed it and then try to fix my posture.

As such, my hand was racing downwards while I kept eyeing Markus. Just as I was grabbing the sword, he was halfway there, just short of catching me if I were to retreat. And yet, that didn’t happen. As soon as I closed my hand around the handle, my skin began to hurt like I grabbed a handful of acid. Searing pain shot through my arm, even as I let go of the sword in a matter of milliseconds. And yet, the pain didn’t stop there. It felt as if my very soul was under attack and the pain in my hand just wouldn’t stop.

I was an easy target, if not unmissable. Markus´ fist perfectly hit my jaw, making my teeth gnash in my mouth. I stumbled backwards, confused by what was happening around me as my vision spun and I hit the ground.

“Win for Markus.” I was kind of thankful for Arthur. He could have just said nothing and let Markus hit me further, but he didn’t do so. I couldn’t form any coherent thought right then, most importantly because this kind of pain was new to me. It felt like my very core was burning right then, and I could do nothing against it. A few seconds later, the pain that plagued my soul disappeared as fast as it came, leaving me with a hurting tongue, and a hurting hand. It looked like third-degree burns and blisters were still being created as I looked at my hand.

“What the hell?” I asked out loud as my skin didn’t heal right away as I was used to. Whatever it was, something about this sword was cursed.

With a huge grin on his face, Markus gave me an answer as I spewed blood out of my mouth. At least my tongue was healing as fast as I expected. “Holy water. You aren’t as different to the other vampires as you claimed to be.”

Only after he said that did my hand finally start to heal slowly. It was quite an eye-opener. Water was even eviler than I assumed it was and could be used in ways against me I never thought of. Aska never really told me how different I was from a normal vampire, but appeared as if there were still quite a lot of similarities between me and them. I could endure the sun, but I would get incredibly tired when I was directly hit by it. And holy water was apparently a weakness of mine. So what was I?

A special Vampire?

Something else entirely?

Or a mixture of both?

This was a question I couldn’t answer yet and didn’t intend to. The fight with Markus wasn’t over yet and as such, I needed to be focused.