by C K Gold
A handcart stacked two men high with woven mats trundled directly across Fang’s path. He stopped short and looked to the sides; on the right was a partly blocked alley, and on the left, a rickshaw had nearly collided with the handcart. Fang didn’t need to look back to guess that he was penned in. The rickshaw driver cursed at the cart-puller, whose act was punctuated with too many darted glances at Fang to seem natural.
They’re not going to wait for me to make a mistake. They’re trying to herd me into one. It was a brazen move, and one Fang admired. Other traffic adjusted to flow smoothly past the scene in a collective agreement to ignore what was going on. No one wanted to be involved.
Mats fell off the cart as the rickshaw driver shoved the cart-puller. The woman inside the rickshaw cursed and stepped out, throwing a pittance of coin at the men before stomping off in silken slippers that would be quickly ruined by the rough streets. Maybe part of the trap simply relied on good luck. Well, bad luck for me.
Fang started to shove past both men, but the cart-puller threw a desperate punch past the driver’s ear. Fang leaned away and caught the driver when the puller drove a shoulder into the man’s gut. The unlucky driver almost collided with Fang’s butcher knife, which he lifted clear of the fray.
“Now that’s stupid,” he said mildly, and clobbered the cart-puller with the jug. As if the sound of shattering crockery had awakened them, the lingering toughs who’d trailed Fang joined in.
One grabbed at his tunic with a “Hey now,” but as Fang turned, the second went for a sucker punch. Fang blocked the shot with what remained of his jug — the handle and a bit of sharp, broken ceramic. The second man reeled back with potsherds sticking from his fingers.
Birch would enjoy this.
Fang swept his leg under the first man who’d grabbed him and threw the handle at the third, who dodged the harmless thing. With three of the four would-be grabbers out of commission, Fang stepped over the cart-puller and brushed some dust off the stunned driver’s shoulders.
“Talk to that guy about compensation,” Fang said, and settled his butcher knife on his shoulder again as he walked off.
They were turning desperate. What other surprises do they have for me? The gangsters wouldn’t kill him right in front of everyone — surely they were also worried about Fang having backup out here.
Of course, Fang hadn’t really organized anything like that. At best, the others would slow him down, and at worst they would try to steal his glory. No, the real worst would be them tailing me to meeting Birch and Orchid, then reporting on me. Even if the tail didn’t know who Birch and Orchid were, Red Hand or one of Fang’s so-called elder brothers would figure it out quickly. Fang didn’t need to double his enemies by having untrustworthy allies at his back. He was in a one-man war. Victory required outrageous feats worthy of a hero.
Fang narrowed his eyes as the traffic ahead seemed to gradually melt away. Five toughs with blue sashes waited in front of him, each brandishing a weapon. He judged them instantly, already calculating his chances of defeating them all or escaping. The alley he’d defeated Leadnose in had given him the advantage of only being approachable on two sides. But the avenue was wide enough that he’d be completely surrounded. Staff, rope dart, saber, mace, and… a man-hook?
The man-hook was designed to grab men and pin them between its twin tines just enough that a captive couldn’t strike the captor. Of course, sometimes a man simply got run through, but the intent was enough to take Fang aback. The Moon Knives wanted to capture him. Who ordered this? Boar or one of his bodyguards? And out in the open?
Fang shifted into a defensive stance with the knife in his leading fist as the last peasants slipped away. He was surprised by the Knives’ boldness, but that didn’t mean he’d let them get the better of him.
The five Knives rushed Fang like a wave, with the first two to reach him attacking almost as one. Once the initial surprise melted into battle lust, Fang recognized the one who’d moved first as Jie, another of Boar’s best bodyguards.
Jie slashed at Fang’s head with a two-handed saber as the thug wielding a staff tried to take Fang out at the knee. Fang blocked the saber slash with the massive butcher knife, which was nearly a short sword in its own right, and jumped the staff. The clash rang down the knife’s hilt, numbing Fang’s hand, and he felt, rather than saw, a wedge gouged out of the blade from the force of Jie’s blow.
The others surrounded Fang too quickly for him to break free and make a run for freedom. His only real advantage lay in the fact that the Knives’ weapons were as dangerous to each other as they were to him. Only the woman with the rope-dart hung back a bit as she sought openings. He didn’t want to tangle with that dart; it had a nasty gleam that suggested poison – probably not the type that killed quickly.
Jie was persistent and easily the strongest of the fighters. Each of his blows bit another chunk out of Fang’s knife until it began to look more like a saw. But Jie’s wide arcing swings also forced his allies to back off — especially the squat one with the mace, who couldn’t get close enough without risking his own head.
As Jie drove Fang back, he angled his retreat to take him closer to the stalls. If the man-catcher caught him unaware, he was done for; moreover, he wanted as many obstacles as possible between himself and that dart.
The staff swung at his knees again, then switched to a jab at Fang’s heart. Fang twisted to let the staff graze past and grabbed it one-handed. As the staff’s wielder struggled to regain control of his weapon, Fang swung the staff, menacing the others with the danger of accidentally striking a brother. The Knives scattered, with only Jie persisting.
“Take him down!” Jie bellowed. Sweat glistened on his narrow face; Fang grinned. It seemed he wasn’t the only one in a desperate position. “At all costs!”
The staff wielder’s eyes widened to show yellowed whites all the way around. He released the staff as the maceman charged. With the staff braced under his armpit, Fang whirled and smashed the maceman in the jaw, dropping him to the dust. A heavy scuff warned Fang in time to fling the staff at the man-catcher and sidestep to the left, taking him into the middle of the avenue as Jie brought down a mighty overhand chop. Fang met the overhand swing with the chewed-up edge of his knife against Jie’s descending right wrist.
Jie screamed as the ragged metal crunched into flesh and bone under the power of his momentum. He dropped the saber and clutched his ruined wrist. The man-catcher glanced at his crippled leader, unconscious maceman, and the staff user crawling away from the fray, then fled.
Only the dart woman remained. Fang eyed her as he carefully squatted to retrieve Jie’s saber. Its edge had taken some abuse, but the harder steel meant it was in far better shape than the knife he’d just mangled Jie with. Fang rose slowly, circling to the right to keep the rope-dart in sight. Jie was no longer a concern. The man couldn’t even muffle his sobs. He’d be stuck wiping his ass and eating his meals with his left hand for the rest of his life.
Maybe there was more to Jie’s gang than met the eye. As Fang backed up the street, the rope-dart woman didn’t follow. She watched him with a slit-eyed, burning hatred, the kind that meant she’d marked him as a personal foe. Fang didn’t have time to figure out which of the others had triggered that response. He turned and ran once he was out of her range. He had to reach the Knives’ headquarters without being caught in any more ambushes.
The avenue climbed a gentle slope as it led away from the harbor. As Fang ran, he glanced behind him just once to see if the Knives were regrouping. Below, the dark waters glistened beneath the morning sun. The day wasn’t even half over yet.
He crested the hill to find that the fight hadn’t completely disrupted trade. A woman trading turnips squawked as she spotted Fang and his bloody saber; he tucked it under his arm and moderated his pace to a half-run. He shouldered his way past men and women alike, quickly giving up on niceties. Most complaints stilled when the victims of his discourtesy noticed his bloodstained state.
More Knives caught up with him as he neared their compound at the edge of the precinct. They were lesser members who didn’t even have proper sashes, just blue scraps tied wherever to indicate their allegiance. Fang was firmly within their territory now, but he’d not shown up without making advance preparations. Not everyone was happy with the Moon Knives’ status as the lords of northern Dockside. Fang slipped into an alley perfect for a trap. A spearman waited at the other end, wielding a spear no doubt “misplaced” by some unlucky provincial guard.
“That’s a hanging offense,” Fang said. He knocked on the door to his right and the spearman sneered; that door had long been fastened shut and the rooms it led into were abandoned. Footsteps pounded into the alley behind him.
The door swung open just enough to admit Fang, then slammed shut behind him. A door bar thudded into place as the first blows smashed against its exterior. A couple of dark-smeared, grinning faces met his in the gloom.
“Get moving,” one whispered as they worked to blockade the door.
Fang made his way through the messy interior; he approved. All the obstacles would slow anyone who waited to chase him through the tenement. He snatched a dusty, faded curtain from one of the doorways and wrapped it around his shoulders before emerging back onto the avenue.
The Knives were looking for him, but they’d lost him for the moment. He hurried to the compound and made his way down one of the narrow paths just outside its high, plastered outer wall. His heart jumped as a couple of armed Knives with proper sashes rushed toward him, but on instinct he backed against the wall and bowed his head like a fearful peasant. They moved past him without sparing him a second look.
Just beyond, the path widened to something almost like a garden. Beneath a dying bush, concealed under dead moss, was a rope and grappling hook. Fang stuffed them under his makeshift cloak, which was a particularly drab, sun-faded ochre, not too far off from dried blood.
It wouldn’t take long before someone raised the alarm. Fang hurried along to the point where the mansion joined the compound’s exterior wall. The Moon Knives’ compound was basically a fortress unto itself, one of the old, original homesteads built after Deepwater’s founding. Whether the modern Moon Knives gang descended from the family that’d built the place, though, was a mystery, and one not worth plumbing. Fang tore the fabric off and whirled the grappling hook.
Someone shouted. The race was on. Fang hurled the hook and it snagged on a third-story railing. Without wasting another second, Fang clenched the saber between his teeth, braced his feet against the wall, and climbed up, taking the loose end of the rope up after. He’d practiced the maneuver back at the Four Winds compound, ignoring the murmurs of subordinates and the mockery of his elder brothers alike. Now it paid off. He pulled himself over the railing with burning arms and dropped the rope on the balcony.
The balcony door beckoned. Fang gathered himself for a charge, but a scimitar slashed through the ornate wood and paper door a mere hand’s width from his nose.
Boar kicked the ruined sliding door aside. “Just the standard greeting for unannounced guests,” he said, and readied another swing.
Fang rolled aside. Boar arrested the swing before the edge could get caught in the wooden railing, but the effort cost him precious seconds that Fang used to regain his feet. He leapt forward and thrust the saber at Boar’s voluminous gut. Boar and his best bodyguard had a great deal in common, enough that Leadnose was rumored to be his brother or son. Aside from being fat though, Fang wasn’t so sure about the resemblance.
Boar blocked the thrust easily; the saber was poorly balanced and not meant for such narrow confines. But Fang was young and burning with battle lust. The Knives below clamored, but Fang didn’t hear any reinforcements from Boar’s personal chambers yet. He forced Boar back with a series of overhand swings and then backed into the room. Fang had no time to take stock of the opulent decor. Boar might have sent men to take Fang captive, but now that Fang had intruded on his private sanctum, Boar was ready to kill.
Fang mustered all his resilience as Boar rained down blows backed by slabs of muscle. Each blocked strike reverberated through Fang’s bones. He could feel himself flagging little by little as Boar scored cuts, laying open Fang’s shoulders and arms each time Fang was too slow to squarely meet a blow.
He’d spent too much of his stamina just getting here. Now he was locked in a duel against someone well-rested, well-fed, and as strong as his namesake. These gashes were the harbingers of defeat. Fang knew that staying on the defensive now meant death. No one was coming, because Boar didn’t need his subordinates’ help. He could crush Fang alone.
A resounding clash of scimitar against saber shattered the saber’s steel blade. Flying fragments cut Fang’s face and blood trickled into his eyes. Boar’s laugh blasted through the room like the mockery of a fat and petty god. Fang’s ears rang. He glared at Boar over the snapped half of the sword. It hadn’t broken at the hilt, at least. Now it was too short to get caught on anything. Fang ducked under a wide arcing slash. With all his weight behind it, he stabbed the broken saber beneath Boar’s ribs and angled it up. The gang chief’s roar withered to a gurgle. He knocked Fang back with a meaty fist, but it was over. The scimitar slipped from his failing fingers.
For the third time that day, Fang picked up a blade that wasn’t his. He hefted it, estimating the strength he’d need to summon to hack through such a thick neck. It took three chops to sever the bastard’s head, and not only because Fang’s arms were tiring. The blade was dull, too.
That was when the footsteps churned up from below.
Chapter 2
A sharp pain yanked Fang from dreams of faintly soap-scented limbs. A hundred aches washed over him like a rising tide. The air smelled familiarly of smoke and exotic angelica. Somehow he’d gotten back to the compound. He’d survived long enough to endure the indignity of someone stripping his clothes and prodding him. It couldn’t be one of his brothers; they would’ve simply murdered him by now. Wasn’t Birch, either. No force between heaven and earth would get him inside Four Winds’ walls.
Fang slit open one swollen eye at the keen sting of a particularly clumsy stitch. Dim sunlight lit his caretaker from behind with a blurry halo. The brazier at his side provided more heat than light. It took a few seconds for his vision to resolve.
“Goat,” Fang said.
“You’re awake! Maybe, um, don’t move for just a minute.”
Fang blinked crust away from his eyes. His body felt so heavy that he wasn’t inclined to move anyway, and less so knowing one of his junior brothers was behind the suturer’s needle rather than an actual doctor. He stared past Goat’s ear, thankful he couldn’t see what kind of expression the kid was making as he played tailor with Fang’s flesh.
Goat was barely out of his boyhood. He’d settled somewhere in the lower ranks of the gang’s brothers — not stupid enough to be at the bottom, but not ambitious enough to climb up the rungs. He was chubby, and his plain, round face was notable only for its constant, earnest expressions. Not something anyone generally expected to see among gangsters.
Fang didn’t even know his real name; everyone called the kid Goat because he could seemingly eat anything, and often in enormous amounts.
A clumsily tied-off knot was the signal that Fang could move again.
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
Goat leaned back. He’d evidently pulled up a stool from somewhere — certainly not Fang’s barren quarters. “Well, the boss told me not to let you die, or he’d make me into one of them singin’ boys.”
“I’m not dead, so you can go.”
“Oh, I don’t mind. It’s better than standing guard. Besides, I don’t have to worry about making you uglier.”
Fang scowled. The kid was being awfully familiar.
“Anyhow,” Goat hurried to add, “I owe you — this is no trouble at all.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Fang said. All t
he scowling only reminded him he’d nearly gotten his brow split open by Jie. “Anyway, how did I get back here?”
“It sounds like you weren’t real hard to follow,” Goat said.
Fang’s heart stuttered. Did someone tail me to the Rose Maze? If they saw Birch and me… The blood drained from his face, leaving him cold.
Goat didn’t notice. He’d already moved on to describing the trail of carnage outside the Moon Knives’ headquarters. “And then they found you face down in a pile of bodies! The Knives are gonna be in a world of hurt for a real long time thanks to you. How’d you even get that strong? You gotta tell me your secret, big brother.”
Revenge. But saying as much was pure foolishness. “No secret,” Fang said.
Goat raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure about that?” He pulled something out of the fold of his tunic and tapped it against Fang’s bandaged breastbone.
Fang had to crane his neck to look at it, a move that threatened to pop new and unseen stitches. Between Goat’s fingers was a tightly folded piece of paper, folded so it was hardly bigger than a girl’s smallest finger. Fang snatched it lest Goat try to jerk it away. He rolled painfully to his side. The paper unrolled easily in his hands — too easily. The folded notes always had a tucked-in flap to keep them shut.
“Goat,” he said warningly. Wounded or not, Fang had no problem snapping a man’s neck to silence him. Fang’s mission was too important to gamble on one lone idiot. He sat up slowly with the partially unrolled missive in his off-hand, the other curled into a loose but ready fist.
Goat raised his empty hands. “Whoa, like I said, I owe you my life. Your secret’s safe with me.”
“If you even breathe a word of this to anyone,” Fang said, voice low.
“Then you can do whatever you want with me if someone else doesn’t get there first. I’m on your side. You dragged me out of that warehouse fire when no one else would’ve gone back for a nobody like me. All right? Anyway, I’m not done yet, and if I don’t do a good job and you get infected, boss will have my balls.”
