Phyandarst, brother to the emperor, Knizor, has secretly orchestrated a war with another empire to gain the throne. Phyandarst is fighting on Knizor's side but is secretly coordinating the enemy attacks. Knizor's right hand dragon (all the characters are dragons) is a blacksmith named Rishta. He is the Hamilton to Knizor's Washington, the Teancum to Knizor's Moroni. Second in Knizor's circle of trust are Alkandar and Arabur, two good friends who share Rishta's rank of command. Phyandarst instigates a duel between them, then tips them off that the other dragon intends to kill them, against the rules of dueling which dictate the duel ends after first blood. (The duel is fought with swords, so death is incredibly rare as the contest ends with the first scratch, however minor.) This causes them to kill each other in self-defense. Both ask Rishta to be their second. (Knizor can't know about this.) Rishta, torn between the two, eventually chooses Alkandar. Arabur is offended, but Phyandarst, feigning sympathy, becomes his second. My question: how could Phyandarst get such two close friends so angry with each other that they would choose to settle it over a duel? Keep in mind that they enter the duel thinking their opponent will try to kill them, instead of entering the duel intending to kill their opponent. So they don't start off angry enough to kill each other over whatever it is, but angry enough to duel over it.
say one of them betrayed the other for example: *perhaps cheat on a wife or female to whom one of them cares for *or one of them killed someone or was apart of something that got a loved one killed *reveal a horrible or dangerous secret and say one of them revealed it *have a precious keepsake stolen for one of them and have it seen the other was the one who took it or even destroyed it *blame a missing person on one of them * have a someone of great respect like an old teacher get demoted, jailed, harmed and have them think the other was the cause of it hope these suggestions help please let me know what u like the best if you like one of them.
Then one would be in the wrong and I want neither or both to be in the wrong. But I got it figured out.
when I say "say" I mean frame, lie about them doing my suggestions. so they would be innocent but believe the other did something horrible or wrong. like a enemy gets two of his enemies to kill each other by killing one of their mutual friends and making it so they think the other had killed that person by planting evidence framing them up. so making them do the duel to revenge the dead friend, but neither did kill him.
You can spin cheating so they are both innocent - the person they were both involved with kept her involvement with the other secret, or claimed that she had a non-monogamy agreement when she didn't, or something like that. The friends both don't realize that she was lying to the other friend and instead think he knowingly cheated.
It doesn't matter if either of them is actually in the wrong - they just have to think that the other was doing something bad. It's all about perception, in this case. Like Ettina said, it could be because someone's deliberately lying, trying to set one of them up, or it could just be a simple misunderstanding, if both are too proud to talk to each other properly.
Do you even realise how standoffish you come across? People are trying to help you. Try saying thanks.
