Healing through fighting

The fight was fast, once again.  This time blood had been spilled on the both of them.  Rudyard had lost and that was frustrating but it was hardly a new frustration.  His brother was a damn good fighter and too damn tall and bulky.  Rudy had been willing to lose a bit of blood to win but the win would have to come another day.  Either he had to get stronger and faster or just trickier than Art.  Rudy had seen the paw coming but still was surprised at the force of impact.  Not that he was upset about it, truly Rudy was glad Artorias was willing to take the fight seriously enough, even if it did mean a bit more blood.  The new pain was minor and would cause no lasting damage so easy to brush off.

A soft grunt was let out as his body hit the ground, between the whack to the head and impact into the ground his brain took a few heartbeats to adjust.  Ironically in this case it was a good thing, those few heartbeats were all the time Art needed to step back and Rudy had no time to get concerned by it.  Rudy stood up, a flash of a grimace at the abused he’d just given his healing body.  A simple scrap or two and he could feel it in his bones. The pain was offset though, the earlier fear was offset in the fact he had gotten to fight.  Getting to take out some of that frustration and unused energy was more than worth the ache and stinging pain from the whole thing.  Some back part of his mind warned him it would hurt more the moment the energy granted from the fight faded.  Didn’t matter though, it was still worth it.

Silently he agreed with Art that it was indeed enough but he smirked at it all the same.  “Tired already huh?” Rudy had a lot of things he needed to fix but at least he felt refreshed enough to give at least one teasing jab to his brother.  “I’m alright.  So long as no one tells Gwynn we’ll probably both live.”  Rudy looked more focused at Artorias at that thought, somberly stating “no one needs to know about it, right?”  The ‘it’ being his panic attack and he doubted Artorias would tell anyone but it would feel better to hear the reassurance.  The last things Rudy wanted was anyone to try and pity him or label him a coward.  There were surely some wolves who would do one or the other and Rudy would have none of it.  Any family member who saw it would just have one more thing to worry about.  “Thanks though, I did need it.”

"Speech"