treading the edge

Maddog, Tracer and Dusland

I whip my head to the side just in time to dodge an arrow from My friend maddog. He flinches when he realizes that someone is here, and he almost shot them. He suddenly loads his bow once more, ready to shoot. My name is Ember. In case you haven't figured it out, I'm a warrior. Yes, girls can be warriors too.

I've grown up in a small country-like area, named dusland. We train for battle with reefland. Reefland is definitely the higher class against us. With more food, recorces, and everything, we don't usually stand a chance against them.

My only friend in this world is Tracer. Tracer trains horses on his farm, and he's a good person to be friends with for that very reason. You see, we don't really have much in Dusland. The government supports Reefland more than they support us. So, horses are rare if you're not using one in battle.

Tracer breeds and sells horses at auctions for Reefland citizens. And if you buy straight from Tracers barn in Dusland, it costs a fortune. You're not allowed to just give away horses, the government forbids it. Tracer let me have one anyway, and we never got caught. So he owed me one for a while, but, I've saved his life more than once, so we're even.

I look back to maddog, my eyes flooding with anger.

Maddog returns the look.

"Can't you see I'm practicing here? Forget it."

Maddog has another name. It's Maddox. But the whole town has pretty much named him maddog. He really is one. He dropped out of school to be a full time rebel after his parents died.

Behind him, is a snarling heap of fur, His 'pet' is a vicious half wolf, half dog, he found in the forest a while back. That thing scares the life out of everyone. If maddog can't win a fight with you, it's ironic, because his 'mad dog' certainly can. He's yelled 'sic em' more times than I can count.

Anyways, maddog drops his deranged bow, and Kiba, (the dog) picks it up and carries it off behind him.

"Sorry maddog, it's not your fault."

I try to call after him, but he is probably halfway to his horse by now. (He got a horse from Tracer too.)   

Just as I start to walk off towards the berry bushes that I was trying to get to in the first place, Tracer almost crashes into me. He had obviously been running through the hollow for some reason, and I can see the fear in his eyes.

"Tracer. What is it?"

He can barely speak, but the few words he gets out are enough for me to know exactly what's wrong.

"Tracer, talk to me!"  I shake him.

"B-blaze is here." Tracer sits down on a tree stump, panting.

"Reefland is attacking."