A Parthan Summer by Julie Steimle (best books for 8th graders TXT) 📖

routines. By far the best was Amy Fields. No one had perfected her routine better than Amy. Not even Holly who had improved her floor routine from the last time Zormna had watched. Though, secretly Zormna wanted her to trip and fall on her face.

“Well done, Miss Joyce,” the lady official said, “You have improved immensely from last year.”

Holly smiled with a smug grin, though she turned to see if Zormna was watching, lifting her chin and likewise her nose into the air.

Zormna picked at her fingernails and waited.

Grinning more broadly with satisfaction, Holly strutted off the matt. A few girls snickered when she walked by.

When all the floor routines had finished, they moved to the vault. Only five girls attempted this one. A number of them feared they might break their ankles, though Zormna considered the vault too quick and less to her tastes of showmanship. However, ten girls demonstrated their skill on the balance beam. Zormna had to wait her turn. Her turn was after Amy, who also liked the balance beam and was particularly nervous.

“Ooh, that was good,” Amy whispered, watching a Billsburg girl perform an aerial on the beam, landing well.

Zormna nodded and took in a breath. If they had been competing, her running in the ranks would have been tight. Admittedly, Amy was the best gymnast in the group. She just had that something. That girl from Billsburg was a close second. Zormna ranked herself third with Holly right behind, with a degree of proud satisfaction. She would have ranked herself higher, but the kind of gymnastics they were doing had a different aim than the one she had used it for—which had been entirely for combat. Even though Zormna was a natural born show-off, she had no patience for the presumed grace and style the judges wanted. All she ever used it for was to play a game of pronuk or to catch a runaway criminal. This was the first time she had to treat it like an art…and her artistic side was quite inert.

Amy stepped up to the beam. Zormna watched her beautiful performance, admiring how well it was done. And when Amy dismounted, she gave Zormna an encouraging thumbs-up. Smiling at the adorably sweet and easy-going girl, Zormna approached the balance beam. 

Taking a breath, she hopped up then started into her routine. The official just stared as the act commenced, though Zormna didn’t notice it. The moment she lighted onto the balance beam, her mind was only upon that beam. All the anger, the heat of the competition, the fear of being watched by the likes of Maya Brown and Holly Joyce slipped away. Once again she felt in a place she recognized as home.

Her routine went quickly—perhaps too quickly with how the people watching blinked at her. Zormna flipped and landed with balance so perfect that she smiled at the touch under her foot and decided to do it again, except this time catching with her hands instead of her foot. Her air flip, landing, splits and then standing on one hand, she bent low—then Zormna launched again, spun with a twist and landed again with a perfect stand as if she had been standing there stationary the entire time. The flips and turns were delivered so accurately, so skillfully that even Zormna’s flare for the tricks blossomed as she went along, much like the sweat on her forehead that sprouted in droplets and sprayed off into her clipped-back hair. The gymnast official’s mouth just gaped as Zormna decidedly dismounted with a twist and flip—landing perfectly with no bounce.

Zormna bowed, grinning broadly as she took in her breath of air. Nearly all the girls clapped and cheered her. Nearly. Holly’s hands stayed silently by her side, and Maya was wringing her hands rather than clapping them.

“Excellent! Excellent! I thought that—” The woman barely got in two words to Zormna, arms open to hug her, but Zormna skirted away from the arms and merely bowed to Coach Dayes. She then picked up her things and left the hall without a word to anyone.

The official watched with a more open mouth, gaping much like a fish, appalled at Zormna’s rudeness. “Well, I never!”

Holly glared after Zormna as she said aloud, “She’s a jerk.”

“She’s just having a bad day,” Amy retorted.

Maya pressed her lips together and said nothing.

It was three o’clock when the last competition took place. The Harvest karate team hosted a show for the entire camp, judged by their sensei. They also had a couple of coaches to act as impartial judges to balance him out—just in case the sensei favored any one of his students. Nearly all the campers gathered on the grassy knoll to watch. They had set up a pad in the center where the karate students fought and demonstrated. Most of the students found seats in the shade of the pine trees near the knoll on the edge of the grass, but Zormna waited inside the tree, looking down with eagle eyes through the boughs, glaring at Holly the entire time. A few others were in lower the branches.

The many other students that had come to watch, including the Billsburg and Pennington teens that didn’t have karate at their schools, picked their favorites and cheered them on. But mostly it was an exhibition of skill—which in a way verified the impression Zormna had formed about the team.

Some of the students demonstrated weapons such as nun-chucks and sword wielding. These were provided by the sensei. They also had board breaking. Nothing intense though. Many of the students were disappointed that there was no dramatic, movie-style karate fighting. No Karate Kid kicks, no special tricks. Nothing fancy. Many had whispered that Zormna had been right about the Harvest team. But in the end they had some sparring between boys and girls—and Holly Joyce, their famous black belt, predictably came out as champion.

“Ah, the only reason she’s champion is because no boys bigger than her are in their karate group,” someone said.

“Yeah. All the boys in the club are scrawny freshmen and sophomores,” his pal agreed.

Most figured that was probably true. Holly was a senior and super model tall after all.

 But the karate girl—who was the only one black belt of the group—maintained a smug grin when she heard their jibes. With a nod to a friend who jogged off for something, she then called out to the crowd in a loud voice, “Anyone who thinks this is just for show can come out here and fight me.”

Zormna kept her cool on her branch, waiting still for her moment. She clutched the bark in her fists. She had figured out that Holly had heard her say that. But she was not to be pushed into a pointless fight. All fights had to have a purpose.  

Jeff’s team members laughed and nudged him. “Go on! Fight her! You’re State Champ!”

The crowd around them rippled with laughter, especially when Jeff retorted while his face flushed slightly pink. “She’s a girl. It wouldn’t be a fair contest. I’d be afraid I’d hurt her.”

Holly laughed, which turned heads. She said with a confident grin and a proud glitter in her eyes, “Contrary to what others might think,” hinting in the wrestler’s general direction with a smirk in her eyes, “This is not a contest of muscle and mass, but of concentration and skill.”

The wrestlers bristled, though Jeff narrowed his gaze some.

“I could probably even beat the state champ wrestler in a fight,” she bragged.

There was no smile on Jeff’s face now. His glare had settled like Zormna’s. And for a second he considered getting up to disprove that theory. Instead he opened his mouth to tell her off. But Jonathan beat him to it with a laugh. “Not unless you can beat Zormna first! The super-ninja can whip Jeff’s butt!”

Immediately going red, Jeff slapped Jonathan on the back of his head. “Knock it off!” But Jeff was laughing.

And all the wrestlers, especially those Jeff had just beaten earlier that day as state champ, stared at him. Especially Damon who already knew Zormna was a ‘super-ninja’.

“Admittedly,” Jeff said while scratching the back of his neck and blushing. “She is better than I am. But she was raised in a military school, you know. She’s been doing martial arts since forever.”

Holly’s smile vanished slightly. Jeff obviously was not going to fight her, but then he really didn’t seem to be her target anyway.

Her friend jogged onto the mat carrying a small brown paper bag like the ones they used for snipe hunting. Taking it from her, Holly opened it up and pulled out the contents.

“I will give this medal to anyone who can beat me.” Her voice carried as her eyes scanned the faces for the one she was after.

Jeff leaned forward, his eyes growing wide as his mouth popped open. Maya and Coach Brown, as well as the watching cook’s helper, also stood straighter with a start.

Zormna jumped out of the tree immediately, landing on the cool grass as if she had been a lynx leaping after prey. “That’s mine!”

Holly blinked and turned. She stepped back as Zormna tromped over the lawn towards her, extending her hand for the medallion. She was still in her Pennington red and black gymnastics uniform, which was a leotard and cut-off shorts with the skull and crossbones.

Others backed off, though Jeff leaned forward with a grin. He rested more comfortably in the grass, waiting for a truly pleasurable show.

Stomping onto the mat, Zormna demanded loudly in her Irish trill, “Give me my medallion back. That is mine, and you know it.”

Holding it like she was playing a game of keep-away, Holly said, “I found it.”

“Like roach you did! You got it off my neck, you thief!” Zormna growled, clenching her fists as well as her teeth.

Jeff cupped his hands and called out. “Fight her for it, Zormna!”

Zormna glanced back at him. She had first looked like she wanted to slap him, but then her expression changed. She nodded. A grin spread ear to ear with a devious curl at one side.

Jeff yelled again. “Kick her butt!” 

The wrestling crowd laughed.

Holly did not smile.

“Yeah, fight me, Zormna.” She dangled the medallion on its chain, swinging it as if teasing a cat. “If you think you have the guts.”

Turning towards the judges, Zormna asked, “Can I draw blood?”

Someone from the Pennington crowd laughed, though it wasn’t Jeff. He merely smirked.

“Of course not!” their cry echoed back to, though Holly had frozen at the suggestion.

The sensei of the Harvest High dojo stepped forward in case he needed to cancel the fight, glancing at Holly to tell her to go easy. “Nothing below the belt. No dirty fighting.”

“Clarify dirty fighting.” Zormna wrinkled her nose, as she set a hand on her hip and cocked her head to the side. “I was trained for combat.”

Holly huffed. “No scratching, biting, poking out eyes. This is karate, not a catfight.”

“Meow!” called out someone in the crowd as others made hissing sounds. Obviously everyone did see it as a catfight. Since day one Zormna and Holly had been at odds.

“Does this include tackling or pinning the other person?” Zormna asked the judge rather than Holly. “As I don’t really know this karate.”

Those from Pennington who knew Zormna burst out laughing again.

Making herself clear, Zormna said, “I mean—how do you know when I’ve won?”

“If you win.” Holly corrected, putting her hands on her hips.

The listening crowds broke into hissing whispers.

The judges themselves deliberated, casting looks at Zormna while shaking their heads. After all, Zormna was barely breaking five feet, and Zormna frequently gave of the impression that she was made of porcelain. While Holly was a robust and healthy supermodel. And yet, others among them pointed to Jeff and the Pennington kids who all watched eagerly as if Zormna was their hero and the fight would be worth watching. The phrase ‘super-ninja’ spread through them quicker than a virus.

One of the judges lifted his head with a shrewd eye on