“Well, little Gzarling,” crooned PJ as she swished away the broken sword at her feet with a swipe of her wooden rapier, scattered dead pine needles into the air, “I see now why the great country of Grulovia fell.”
The prone and battered form before her let out a pitiful whine, to which PJ rolled her eyes, “God you’re pathetic, how do you expect to rule anything if you can’t even stand on your own?”
Silence. Then weakly, “…I-I am Gzar, I… I have armies that will…”
“Armies?” PJ made a show of looking around the forest clearing, “I see no armies.” Soft fluttering aloft, she smirked upward at the gathered birds of prey, “Well, except for mine.”
A vulture hissed from above, she squinted a warning at it. Patience.
The man struggled to raise his head from the dirt. “It is… by right, by my right, that I rule!” He finally met her eye, she saw desperation in it.
“Oh, I’m quite familiar with that right, the right of blood,” PJ remarked, stepping forward and forcefully planting the sword in the ground between them. The sudden motion made Gristol flinch, much to PJ’s delight. Gripping the handle tight, she knelt down to his level. “But tell me, Gristle, are you familiar with the right of conquest?”
The briefest flash of indignation at the demeaning nickname she had for him, Gristol gritted his teeth, “My name-“
“It means,” PJ cut him off, “that when one defeats the ruler of a territory, then that place becomes theirs. Soooo,” she singsonged while flashing a Cheshire grin, “seeing as I’ve thoroughly kicked your ass, guess that makes me the new Gzar of Grulovia!”
“No!” Gristol pulled himself up, wiping the blood from his lip, “Grulovia is mine!”
“Then prove it!” PJ turned with a flourish of her cape, the sword left for the Gzarevitch to take up. She paced back across the forest arena.
Crows cawed as PJ pivoted, just as Gristol managed to pull the sword from the ground. Excellent. She reached up into the shifting mass of branches of her dowser, a mockery of the Grulovian crown, and snapped off a long curved spine.
“Come on, little Gzarling,” PJ took her stance, flourishing the newly formed saber before her, “Show me you got what it takes to rule.”
