Jedra vs Sahalik: Half-Elf Fights for Survival - The Darkness Before the Dawn Chapter 2

The chapter opens with Jedra staring at the chief like the man just said it was going to rain. “Anybody here can call anybody else a coward, and that person has to fight? That’s a tribal rule?”

Yep. That is the rule.

Jedra strips off his robe and hands it to Kayan. He is now standing in a breechcloth and sandals against an elf warrior who is easily twice his weight, missing two teeth from previous fights, and grinning like he already won. The elves are betting on how long it will last. Jedra has never been in a proper fight in his life. All his previous experience was street ambushes and running away before things got bad.

The Fight

“I will feed your bones to the kanks,” Sahalik says.

Jedra’s comeback: “They’ll be too busy feeding on your bloated carcass to care.” Then before Sahalik can react, he punches the elf in the stomach with everything he has and dives to the sand.

Here is the problem. Jedra does not know how to throw a punch. He breaks his own hand on the first hit.

Sahalik barely flinches. He goes down when Jedra tangles their legs together, but he is back on his feet in seconds. The fight turns into a brutal mismatch. Sahalik kicks Jedra in the ribs. Jedra manages one good kick to the elf’s face, but it is not enough. Sahalik grabs him, pins him, and starts strangling him.

Jedra is running out of air. Red streamers are swirling in his vision. Kayan is screaming through their mental link to let her help. And for a second, Jedra almost says yes. They could merge minds and blast this elf into pieces.

But he knows what that would mean. Uncontrolled psionic power. Dead elves. Their own deaths immediately after.

So instead, Jedra does something clever. He forges an empathic link with Sahalik. The same wild talent that accidentally connected him to the elf roasting meat in Chapter 1. Now Sahalik can feel everything Jedra feels.

And then Jedra slaps his broken hand against the ground as hard as he can.

The pain is like molten lava running through the bone. Jedra screams. Sahalik screams. The elf’s muscles spasm from the shared agony, and his grip on Jedra’s throat loosens for just an instant.

That is all Jedra needs. He heaves himself up, knocks Sahalik off balance, and scrambles away. But the fight is not really over. Sahalik recovers, grabs Jedra by both legs, and spins him around like a sling. Jedra’s hands pass through the campfire three times before Sahalik launches him completely over the crowd.

He lands hard. Cracks a couple of ribs. Kayan rushes to heal him.

The chief declares that the rules only require Jedra to fight, not to win. He is allowed to stay. But then Sahalik pulls another move. He claims “protectorship” over Kayan because she is human and cannot be part of the tribe. An outsider needs a protector, and he claims that right by conquest.

Kayan Handles It

Kayan is not having it. She agrees to go to Sahalik’s tent, but not for the reason he thinks.

Jedra watches them walk away, furious and heartbroken. Then from inside the tent comes a scream. Not Kayan’s. Sahalik’s. The tent bulges outward like a herd of animals is trying to escape. It collapses. Sahalik crashes through it and keeps running, shrieking into the desert night.

Kayan stands up amid the wreckage, plants her hands on her hips, and says: “Anybody else think I need a protector?”

She used an old templar trick. Showed him a mirror of his own mind. Made him see what he really is. The elf ran from his own reflection.

The Exile

But this is Athas, and nothing good lasts. The tribe sends people after Sahalik, but he is gone. The next morning, while Jedra searches for him psionically, he accidentally contacts a cloud ray. Cloud rays are massive flying creatures with barbed tails that hate psionicists. It attacks the camp.

Jedra and Kayan have to merge minds and fight it. They become a psionic bird of prey, slam the cloud ray into the ground at full speed, and the impact creates a crater. But one elf gets pinned under the creature’s head. Kayan heals him, saves his life, but the damage to the camp is massive. Tents destroyed. Kanks scattered. And the elves are terrified of Jedra and Kayan’s power.

The chief gives them the verdict: “For saving Harat’s life, we have decided to let you live. But only if you leave. Now.”

Galar fights for them one last time, getting the tribe to give them three days of food and water and directions to an oasis. But the chief’s parting words are a death threat: “If we ever see you again, we will bury you up to your necks in the sand and let the carrion eaters feast on your roasted brains.”

So within two chapters, Jedra and Kayan have gone from feasting at a party thrown in their honor to being exiled into the desert with barely enough to survive. That is Dark Sun for you. The good times do not last, and the bad times come fast.

Book: The Darkness Before the Dawn Author: Ryan Hughes (Jerry Oltion) Series: Dark Sun, Chronicles of Athas #2 ISBN: 0-7869-0104-7

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