Chapter 19: Back in the Clearing

(In Which Clementine pays her debt to Amanda)

"I wonder if you two would prefer to wait. Unless you intend wearing something to fight in. You'd at least need some footwear in that snow."

There was concern in Viola's voice as she looked out at the wintry prospect. The day before it had taken her less than a minute to make the distance from her heated car to the heated cottage. By the time she had gratefully shut the door behind her she had been perished. Clementine and Amanda had only just arrived and been hurriedly ushered in through the front door before too much precious warmth escaped. Before coming in they had both stood outside for a good five minutes, their arms round each others shoulders, looking at the path which led to the wood, whose trees were bare of leaves and covered with snow.

Viola had been amazed to see that Clementine wore so little in such extreme cold, but of course she had spent five winters naked in worse weather than this. Her lover had a sweater on, it was true, but it was too short to cover her midriff and the sleeves came down to just above her elbow. Despite the bitter weather, she wore a pair of tiny shorts that left her legs bare from the ankles to the tops of her thighs. Viola was relieved to see that she at least had shoes on for a change.

Amanda was more far sensibly dressed, looking like a Cossack with her fur had and long fur coat. She looked a very grand and imperious young woman and she and Clementine made probably the most striking pair of females she had ever seen together. They were both tall, one fair and the other dark and they both looked like women who needed to command. Two women who like to have their own way, but one was destined to beat the other. Viola wondered what defeat would do to the loser. Both girls appeared fit and ready to do battle, but not outside in this weather - not today, surely?

"How about it, Amanda? If you want to wait until later in the year, I understand." said Clementine in answer to Viola's question. "You can take your clothes off in the clearing if you like. Walking there in the nude can be dispensed with in view of the weather. But I'll be fine. It's not that cold, you know. Maybe a couple of degrees of frost. I've put up with far worse than this, stuck outside all day and all night."

"We have both waited too long for this meeting, my good friend. If you are willing to go out there, then so am I. And if you can walk there naked then so, also, can the incredible Amanda! Get those clothes off and let's go and finish this! What are we waiting for?"

To Viola's horror, if not to her surprise, both girls were standing nude before her in seconds, having torn off their clothes with a fury that said volumes for their mutual desire to fight. Clemmy had had less to remove than the well wrapped up Amanda, but the French girl had still stripped herself a split second before her rival. They had been itching for this ever since their first bloody meeting had ended so indecisively.

"You'd best stay here, darling." said Clementine. "It's not the weather to be standing around watching two maniacs fighting. Tell Estella and George they are to stay here as well when they arrive. This is going to be a very private fight indeed and nobody's business but ours. Come on Amanda. Lets get along to the clearing.!"

"'Aven't you forgotten something, ma cherie? Our nice warm gloves?"

Clementine blushed with shame that she had forgotten in her haste to get this final struggle between the two of them over that they were to wear the metal studded leather gloves again. Viola went out to their car and retrieved them from the boot. She paled in sheer horror when she felt them and imagined what kind of damage they were capable of doing. The she comforted herself with the thought that the pair had already fought one long fight with them and seemed to have healed over pretty well.

Getting back in the cottage, her face pinched with the cold, Viola helped the girls put the gloves on. She kissed Clementine and patted Amanda's shoulder.

"Good luck, you two. May the better girl win, whoever she is! And if you DO win, Amanda like you never tire of telling us you are positively bound to, try to leave something of Clementine left over for me!"

Amanda looked at Clementine and her splendidly conditioned body and then confidently down at her own. "She will be right as rain in a week or two - sooner, with your loving tender care, Viola. And now, au revoir!"

Viola watched as they went out and started walking towards the wood, two tall and strong girls, both with battle scarred bodies and both naked in the bitter cold, their feet leaving perfect imprints on the snow as they crunched through it to their lone duel behind the trees. She wondered who would walk back and who would be carried. She feared for Clementine up against Amanda. Clemmy looked fantastic, of course, with her muscular body which four years of torment had not broken but wonderfully strengthened, but Amanda was a big girl too. And Amanda was a pro who trained every day and had ten times Clemmy's experience. The two were chatting in a friendly way as they walked. Viola gratefully reflected that, whatever the outcome, there would be no hard feelings after this fight. Indeed she was fearful that something was developing between those two that threatened her restored idyll with Clemmy.

"Is this what you 'ad to suffer for five winters, Clementine? You must be tough as nails! I wonder if I could do it. I think I could! I wonder, also, if Rashumba will survive this one, let alone the fifteen she 'as coming! Can't we walk more quickly? My feet are going numb! And another thing. If you win, you must pick me up and carry me back to the cottage. I would die in this weather if I lay on the ground for long. If you wish, I will do the same for you in the event that I win. Frankly, I am not quite one hundred percent certain I can beat you in these conditions. But never would I back away from this fight, Clemmy - never!"

"Yes, Amanda. The winner gets the loser back as quickly as possible. And I agree, that this weather favours me and you might have won if it had been warmer. I think we are almost there! Let's run the last bit and get those poor feet of yours back to life. Mine are fine."

"Lucky old you" replied Amanda sarcastically." We will continue to walk. It is more dignified, oui?"

"Indeed it is, Amanda."

Finally they got to the clearing. Amanda started jumping up and down, no doubt trying to make her feet regain some feeling. Judging by the pained look on her face, she was succeeding and the result was agony! Clementine also did a few warming up exercises. As she did so, her heart thumped madly and stabs of fear sliced through her stomach. When Amanda was finally ready, Clemmy was not surprised to hear her say in her matter of fact and arrogant way.

"And now, Clementine comes the time for me to collect from you the victory I gave away. Last time I was told to let you win because we couldn't have you losing face in front of the other women. You said at the time that I had the edge and you were right. I would have won. In the next round I would certainly have KO'd you, Clemmy - believe me! You are good, but an amateur. And I am better - much better - and I am a pro. And now you are going to find out just how good I am. It will be painful, Clemmy, not only for your body, which will recover in time, but your pride which after today will never be the same again!"

Clementine said nothing, but she knew enough of Amanda to recognise that this young woman chose her words carefully and that her very high estimation of her fighting prowess was soundly based on fact. And the other girl was right about the pride! It would be hard to look others in the face again for a long time. But if she were to be defeated, this was the one girl in the world at whose hands she could just about take it.

She swallowed and extended her gloved fists, trying not to show Amanda how terrified she was. Amanda did likewise and the two touched gloves, the metal studs clacking ominously ( soon they would be crashing into each other's bodies) They stepped back. Amanda bowed slightly and Clemmy did the same. Then they approached the centre of the clearing, where Amanda had trampled the grass and tried to kick away some of its snowy covering. They raised their arms and took up a fighting posture.

Clemmy aimed her first punch at Amanda's face and struck it a glancing blow, but the wily French girl had moved nimbly out of harm's way and replied with a kick, her icy cold toes hitting Clementine hard below the heart. The clearing resounded to the shattering impact of Amanda's opening shot and Clementine dropped on one knee, almost paralysed with the pain. She stayed there for eight seconds and Amanda, ever a sportswoman, waited for her to get up. Clementine was ashamed at this weakness. She'd always thought her belly was hard as rock! But Amanda knew just where to aim and even the hardest and best trained fighter has no defence against the blow she had just landed.

"Careless, my good friend. Very careless. Try not to leave yourself open like that again or we are soon on our way back to the cottage!"

Clemmy was determined not to answer any of Amanda's jibes. She resolved that if she were struck in the same spot again she would fight through the pain and not go down another time. She had a chance to put this resolution into effect seconds later and astonished the other woman by ignoring the debilitating agony and aiming straight at Amanda's right eye, where she saw a small scar that looked to be only recently healed. This blow was rewarded by a trickle of blood which cheered Clementine up no end, until Amanda replied by landing a perfect left hook plumb on her eye, opening up her own accursed cut yet again. She saw the red spots dripping down onto the snow covered ground. But she had caught Amanda out - the ultra vigilant Amanda had been taken unawares and Clemmy took heart from this.

Five minutes into the fight, both antagonists had landed few blows. Clementine had hardly used her feet at all and the only injuries so far were Clemmy's big cut, Amanda's small cut and Clemmy's bruised rib cage, struck twice at the base of her sternum, its boniest and most unprotected part. Once again Clementine was unable to tolerate this wary stalking - this tentative phoney war of a fight. She wheeled round and drove her foot into Amanda's body, thumping her resoundingly in the stomach. If Clemmy had a rock hard belly, then so did Amanda! In the split second that she savoured the sound of her kick echoing in the winter air, her face exploded as Amanda with a punch that came from nowhere, crushed her nose and put her on her back. Amanda started counting - in the absence of a referee. Clemmy managed to get up at the count of nine. She saw bemusedly that her front was covered with blood from her nose and the cut over her eye.

By rights she should have been knocked out soon afterwards, but she was not giving up that easily. She was the Clementine who had beaten Rashumba and Olga and survived four years and four months of a regime that would have killed most people. She would win this fight if it was the last thing she did.

Once again Amanda was too cocksure of herself and once again she paid for it. The straight right that Clemmy aimed at her jaw hit its target spot on and it was a miracle that Amanda got to her feet, dazed herself this time, as Clementine reached "Nine".

Both girls took a bit of a breather then, circling around each other and trying to gather their wits after their near disasters.

At the ten minute stage, Clemmy began to feel she was getting on top. She waded into Amanda again and the air was heavy with the sound of solid blows. Aiming at Amanda's eye she kept up the pressure on that cut and saw it deepen and lengthen until the trickle of blood became a flood which covered her face with crimson. Then she tried to work on the other side and cut her there. She saw, as she worked away, how the body opposite her was reddening, not only with the cold but also the impact of all the kicks and punches she was landing on it.

For a time Clemmy got up close and tried a few kidney punches, but gratefully broke away when Amanda showed her how good she was at in-fighting. It had been good to feel the warmth of her opponent's body, though, and she guessed Amanda felt the same. They backed away a little and started swapping blows. Clemmy winced as she was struck on the breast and replied in kind. Amanda must have been hurt but she didn't show it. At times like this she cursed being a woman as Amanda gave both tits a battering until the two seemed mutually to agree to leave these parts alone. Amanda continued to bleed from her two cuts and Clemmy was landing plenty of hits. She felt herself to be on top!

Estella, Jules and George Fox arrived. They got out of the car and Estella shivered.

"They might have chosen a warmer day for it. We'll be frozen even if those two aren't. Poor Amanda! Clemmy will have a real advantage today. Hey! Look!"

Estella pointed at the two sets of prints leading from the cottage door to the wood. They all went to inspect.

"Only two of them, Darling" said Jules. "Clemmy's large ones and Amanda's smaller ones. And both barefoot in this! I hope they are warming themselves up by now! I think we'd best find out from Viola what's going on."

And so they all waited for Viola to open the door.

"They are doing it without onlookers" she said. "And who would want to stand around out there on a day like this? Come on in. They left about twenty minutes ago. I should think they have been fighting for maybe fifteen by now. I hope it won't be too much longer. I'll heat up some soup for you all."

It was unfortunate that Clementine. in her frenzied attack, scarcely felt what was happening to her until it was too late. But Amanda knew what she was doing. She landed one swift, clean, clinically precise blow - a punch here, a kick there - after another and wasted no effort on wild swings of the kind Clementine was aiming not very effectually. Every expertly timed blow gradually ate the strength from her adversary's wonderful body. She knew her face was bleeding a bit, but it was nothing to what she was doing to the other girl's and if Clementine wanted to wear herself out on her, landing only one good shot in ten and wasting her energy, then let the silly girl!