As hooves clattered against the ground, Gaucho's gaze narrowed. Clearly, the element of surprise was not something that these caves allowed for in any capacity. Not only did the light from his wings likely give his position away (overand above his bugling and stomping around), but the echo of the caves alerted him to the blue mare's arrival long before he could even see her. Turning his broad shoulders to squarely face the cave opening, the warrior waited to see what opponent fate had brought him.
As the darkened mare and the pale bear entered, a stern grin formed across Gaucho's dark lips. Never before had he faced an opponent with such a formidable looking companion. The lure of the unknown abilities of this furred beast intrigued the battle-lust within Gaucho's breast, and he was glad that this mare had answered his call. In his antlers, Mara hissed to the white-creature. Neither she, nor her bonded had ever seen anything like it, but if it had a warrior's heart as she did, then Mara would be glad to sink her teeth into it - should she be so lucky. Winding down from his antlers in a fluid motion, Mara pressed on a small button, which caused sharpened bone-spikes to protrude from the think leather collar around Gaucho's shoulders.
Fight me
The words were unnecessary, but then again, mare's did like to talk didn't they? She advanced upon him, causing her hooves to clatter against the stone. Gaucho's black wings rose from his sides, allowing the heat-less flames to cast even more light around them. Without a horn upon her brow, Gaucho would not have to worry about his wings being sliced (nor any other part of himself, at least, not by a horn. That polar bear on the other hand...). He let her come to him - not wanting to waste energy in bridging the distance between the two, when she was already taking care of that. Given her smaller, slimmer stature and weaponless physique, he assumed she was aiming to slam herself into him. Fool He thought with a grunt, ready to show her the error of her ways with his spikes.
As she neared, Gaucho noted that her body had not tilted in the way he would have assumed it would - her angle was all wrong to collide with his shoulder, or flank. Only as she moved almost directly ahead, did Gaucho realize he had misinterpreted her attack. Gaucho's ears flattened against his dark skull, as he felt her hoof scrape down the thin black skin covering his cannon bone. Where her hoof initially impacted, a red semi-circle of blood instantly appeared, aggravating the cascading wave of pain that already was ricocheting through his leg. With a snarl of pain, Gaucho defaulted into his original plan of thrusting his shoulder forward, trying to scrape the blue skin with his spikes. Likely the left side of her chest was closer, and so would be the most likely target of this pseudo chest-bump.
Gaucho's wings slammed down from his sides, defensively trying to deter a bite while they were in such close proximity; although if her nose was smacked in the process, all the better. Simultaneously, his long neck tried to reach around her neck, to try and bite at the left side - towards her wither where faint traces of white fur began to interrupt the blue.
In his antlers, Mara hissed loudly. She found that opponent's of Gaucho often found this disorienting, and she delighted in knowing this. Yet her attention was not focused upon the blue mare, but the white mass of fur. From one predator to another, she could sense that it had weapons of its own, but what kind? Mentally she relayed what she saw to Gaucho, ensuring that she would warn him should the fur-ball decide to enter the dance.
WC: 634
Attack 1/3
Great opening post! You did a lot of things really well. The first, is setting up Lakota's emotions. By knowing where a character is before something like a spar happens, really allows the reader to understand certain choices they're making. Often spars can seem artificial, because while there's OOC reason for doing them (because you and I wanted to spar together), there often isn't a lot of IC motivation. I explained Gaucho's, and you did a really great job of explaining Lakota's. I particularly like how her mentality is that it's better to beat up strangers, than her own family.
Opportunities for improvement: The first, is that you switch tenses. I can't tell if this was done on purpose or not (I know I unconsciously switch back and forth). You might want to be wary of this, or, if it was intentional, sticking in an to show that there is some sort of narrative break, might be helpful.
Another area, is the ratio of how you're structuring your posts. Keep in mind how these are judged: Realism, Emotion, Prose, and Readability. Realism and Prose are ought of 5, while the other two are only out of two. I think in terms of prose (general literary style, flow), there aren't any big issues here. For realism...I might have expanded your last paragraph more. This is a spar, but ought of your six paragraphs, only one was the actual attack in it. What does Lakota do after she tries to stomp on Gaucho's leg and/or bite him? Is this helping relieve her stress at all? Why did Ao not attack with her? Did she mentally tell him to wait? Also, Gaucho has a spiked collar. If she goes in for his shoulder, that could be problematic given that there are spikes there.
Like I said, really good opener though.
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I Hold On :: Training Spar with Lakota
