Dancing Edge

I looked over my shoulder at my friends and giggled despite myself. I needed to be stealthy as I hunted the dragonflies, but I was really having a good time. I had forgotten how much I loved working in a team with friends. The party was nearly finished killing the giant dragonfly they were attacking and I was already crouching in the brush eyeing my next prey. Our goal was to kill the seventy-pound insects as fast as we could without getting anyone seriously hurt, but I wanted them to feel pretty dang close to death. It made it more fun for me.

Even before the party's fly started to tremble and fall to the ground , my crossbow bolt was flying to another one. I missed. I squinted and rawred in frustration. A good marksman I am not. I just hoped no one had seen me miss; it was so embarrassing.

The bolt whooshed by the giant flying bug and it took notice. Buzzing furiously, it came after me and on long fast legs I sprinted back to the protection of my friends. Once I raced passed the paladin, I skipped back to the group and took my favorite place, right behind the wall that was Gurok.

"Oh come on!" the Jenjen complained, "Can't we at least catch our breath?" The group had not quite finished off the first fly and I had already brought them another. Jenjen jumped up and down on the first struggling fly and it took its last breath.

Gurok laughed. "She's having fun and we can handle it. No one has even hit the ground from blood loss yet."

I took notice of his "yet." I would have protested, but I could get carried away when I was in a good mood and sometimes people were... damaged before we finished. I glared at him anyways, as if he could feel it through the back of his head. He swished his tail at me playful as I stood behind him and tried to execute my sneak attack combos on the fly without being tripped.

Garness' wyvern Rover seemed to be having a good time too . He was breathing fire on the hopeless fly and toasting little holes in it's wings. In his zealousness, he also managed to singe Martin's arm. "Careful!" Martin hollered and whacked Rover across the rear with the flat of his broadsword. That did not make Rover happy. In a red whirlwind, Rover had attacked Martin and rolled him to the ground in a heap.

Garness wrapped his arms around his body and laughed a huge rolling galka belly laugh without offering Martin any help. "Rover doesn't like to be spanked."

The angry wyvern bit holes into Martin's heavy warrior armor and shook his lovely head enthusiastically as he growled. Letting Martin go he glared and bore his teeth as if to warn him to keep his weapons to himself next time then flew back to Garness' side. Garness petted Rover's scaly head and the wyvern nuzzled his master’s hand affectionately in return.

Gurok was handling the brunt force of the fly's powerful attacks while half the party was distracted by Rover and Martin rolling around on the ground. His face was getting moist from the effort and I could tell he needed a hand. The fly was turning the tide of the battle and pushing Gurok back towards the tree-line. He could take a lot of hits but when he was armored up like a tank, he couldn't swing as hard to do a lot of damage. That was our job, if anyone was paying attention. "Not to rush you..." he complained.

Zerokb shared a little healing magic with Gurok with a quiet smile of amusement. I jumped up behind the fly and slashed it back and forth with gracefully lethal slices before killing it with one final powerful gouge up forcing the fly to give up the ghost. "Lovely." I complimented myself.

I didn't go for another victim quite yet. Instead, I flopped down in the grass nearby and rested my hands in my lap. After Rover and Martin's little wrestling match and killing a respectable number of dragonflies, I thought we could take a break to laugh and eat a snack. Gurok didn't look like he was ready to quit, but I was in charge of picking the fights today so he shook himself slightly to get his mind out of fight mode and smiled as he relaxed.

"I guess that means it's break time." Martin said as he jumped up in the air and fell onto a pile of leaves then pulled out a piece of jerky. Rover, still angry from earlier, stole Martin's jerky and flew off with it. Martin stood to his feet awkwardly in his heavy armor and chased the wyvern into the brush out of sight. We were rolling with laughter as we listened to the shouting and rawring not far away.

Wiping a happy tear from my eye, I hugged Jenjen. "I'm sorry." She looked confused. I pulled everyone else within reach towards me and tried to hug them all at once. "Oh," she said as she started to understand and hugged me back. She grinned. "You're you, and we love you and I'm glad you're feeling better today," she purred as she nuzzled.

Martin stumbled back looking a little singed and out of breath. "I missed something." he said flatly and looked disappointed. Then he grinned mischievously, ran, then jumped on top of the group hug nearly breaking my head with his big body. Gurok grabbed him by the back of his armor launched Martin out of the huddle. He got some impressive air before rolling to a stop on the ground "Ooowww..." he groaned as he laughed.

Rover flew back to Garness’ side looking very very proud of himself. I smiled as I looked around at my friends. Today was a good day.

(Thank you to Stephen for another educational editing session. You rock. Check out his blog at http://fourthdayuniverse.blogspot.com Oh and sorry this one took so long. My pc died and I had to wait for a new hard drive and motherboard to be installed. It was painful.)