Rise of the Dragon

by C K Gold

  For his part, Fang answered questions over and over, past the part of exhaustion and back again until the answers became rote and no more questions surprised him. The skeptics mostly stopped trying to trick him. One even asked if he was going to finish the bun; given that Fang had never so much as taken a bite, he handed it over willingly.

  The man didn’t die right away from eating it, which seemed to improve Fang’s reputation. At least people were a little less leery of him, and a touch less cautious about maintaining a safe distance.

  A young woman, her eyes hidden by a faded red cloth, was led over to him by a gray-haired man with an axe belted to his waist.

  “May I touch you?” she asked.

  Fang had already endured the thoughtless, curious pinches and prods of half of the Society, or so he felt. One more request wouldn’t break him. At least she’d been polite.

  “Fine,” he said, and held out his hand. But she reached past him and ran her hand up his muzzle, from nostrils to his eyes. His extra eyelids slid shut in time to save him from two painful pokes.

  “Many men poured their wishes into this stone body,” she said, “yet for you, it’s merely a prison. Love will shatter bars and prisoner both. Only death can set you free.” She withdrew her hand. “It’s your choice. You might live forever as a stone and embody those wishes. You might embrace death and the natural course of your life. I’m glad to have met you, Fang.”

  The gray-hair cleared his throat and whispered, rather too loudly for secrecy, “She means well, and sometimes she’s even right. It sounds dire to me, but give it a good think, son.” He guided the girl away before Fang gathered his thoughts enough to question her.

  Orchid snorted. “Love and death. Poor thing’s brain is soft from being sheltered. Her father guides her around as a fortune teller. People are easily taken in.”

  But Fang and Birch were quiet. Birch’s mere touch had broken Fang’s hide, which was tough enough to barely take a scratch from Big Wei’s best attempt with a steel sword.

  “What is it?” she asked. “Love won’t kill you. That’s foolishness.”

  “The stone was made by monks. Celibate monks, probably. They wanted to become perfect. Why wouldn’t love be seen as a weakness by someone like that? Not compassion or goodwill, but desire,” Birch said.

  Fang scratched at the edge of a bandage. He didn’t have the heart to tell Orchid that if he did bleed, they’d burn away like shreds of paper. “Either way, this won’t be resolved with a kiss, if that’s what you were hoping for.”

  “Is it wrong to hope for more good news?” Orchid said. She hugged him. Fang met Birch’s eyes over her shoulder. She wasn’t the one he wanted to embrace, but he clutched her as tightly as he dared anyway. It had to do for now.

  She sighed into Fang’s neck, but reluctantly let him go. “I need to make sure everyone knows where to go.” She grabbed one of his horns and shook his head a little, then patted Birch’s shoulder. “Don’t maim him while I’m gone,” she said to Birch.

  When they were alone, or at least as close as they could get now that the Society was seriously gearing itself for a battle, Fang studied Birch.

  “Were those your people at Ranu’s gambling parlor?” Fang asked at last.

  “We sent some out to break the fun up for a night. The fires weren’t ours, though.”

  “I figured that much.” Fang clacked his claws together as he thought. “I dropped off a message for Orchid. The woman in charge, the one who spoke up tonight?” Birch looked at him blankly. “Almost as tall as she was thick, real good with a sword.”

  “I think that was Wing. Haven’t seen her around in a while, come to think of it,” Birch said. “But I didn’t usually talk with her.”

  Fang waited for Birch to admit to sending assassins to Red Hand’s warehouse, but no such confession seemed forthcoming.

  “You’re staring,” Birch said. He reached out, but let his hand drop. “This is madness. If I’d even thought that rock would have caused all this, I would’ve just kidnapped you myself.”

  “I’m sure that would’ve worked out great.”

  “Sarcasm just doesn’t sound right from you.”

  “What I want to know is, did your people send this Wing and a bunch of men disguised as Moon Knives to Red Hand’s warehouse?” Fang didn’t hold back his frustration.

  “What? No!” Birch stepped back and raised his hands. “That’s not a good use of manpower. If I wanted to trash the warehouse, we’d make sure it was empty first, then trash the place.” He paused thoughtfully, as though planning something. “And no fire. That’s the problem with torching those warehouses and so on. None of us want to burn Dockside down. This is our home. And if we wanted to attack some gangsters, we’d stick to our present tactics. Tell me what this is about.”

  As Fang explained, he focused on reining in his anger. It wasn’t useful and wouldn’t help him discover what had actually happened that day. “Wing brought a handful of men over to attack the boss’s relic warehouse while he and I were there. We only had a couple of guards with us, not counting the warehouse’s guards, who were posted outside. As far as I know, the attack was anticipated, but not something ssset up from our end as a trick. Wing almost got me. That’s when I bled on the stone and this happened. She and her men were all wearing blue sashes, and she had her face covered… but we’ve fought twice before. I’d know her anywhere now.”

  “Are you sure Red Hand didn’t actually command it himself?” Birch asked.

  Fang slowly shook his head. “I can’t be certain of anything, but I don’t think it was him. If that attack was ordered by one of the brothersss, then you have bigger problems than planning an assault. If you have spies like Wing in the Society, then the boss must already know where I am and why. In that case, reprisal is already coming down on us.”

  Birch paused to think it over. “If we have spies, I don’t think they report to him. If I had to gamble on it, I’d bet on either Big Wei or Two Coins. Big Wei is dead, which cuts any of his connections unless someone else picked them up. They wouldn’t have gone to you, because you crushed him and you’re, no offense, not the richest of Red Hand’s godsons.” He snorted. “Far better off than most of us, though.”

  “You’ve got eyes on the street now, right?” Fang ignored the dig at his income. Thinking about it made him uncomfortable. He hadn’t sold tar or slaves or pressed anyone into prostitution, but the Four Winds had, and he was part of them. Had been part of them.

  “I always have people watching. That’s how I catch you so often.”

  “Aren’t you going to do anything about Wing?” Fang asked, impatient. Birch didn’t seem to feel any urgency about this situation, none at all.

  “Like what? Have her hunted down? You know as well as I that a single soul can hide quite easily in this city. And others agree with her. Until they see you shed some Four Winds blood, our people aren’t likely to back you against one of their own.”

  “Not even at your word?”

  “Not even at Orchid’s,” Birch said. “There’s no proof of any of this, and even if there were, well, she was going after our enemies. Sorry.”

  Fang snorted, spraying a few cinders that startled them both. After hurriedly slapping out any sparks, he asked, “Did you recruit Goat?”

  “No. Thought about it, but I didn’t want to put you in a worse spot. Bad enough that things have fallen out like they have,” Birch said. He rubbed a speck of soot into his sleeve. “He seems like a good man. He shouldn’t have ended up with them.”

  “There are others just like him,” Fang replied.

  Birch squatted just out of reach and rested his elbows on his knees. His gaze fixed on Fang’s hands as though he was memorizing the placement of each scale. “Maybe. It doesn’t change anything, though.”

  “I wish it did. Tell me what the next moves are.”

  “When enough of us are ready, we’ll move on the compound. The word’s being spread, so it won’t be long. It�
�s not just the Society resisting the gangs now. We’ve got the tenants behind us, and we can make sure everyone has something in hand that they can fight with. Anyone who can’t fight gets moved somewhere safer.”

  “How many is enough? How long does it take you to muster your men?” Fang asked, impatient with Birch’s rhetoric. You don’t have to win me over like one of your followers.

  “Tomorrow,” Birch said. When Fang opened his mouth to object, Birch held up a hand to stop him. “I can’t promise that we’ll succeed. I can’t even promise that everyone will be safe from a backlash even if we win. But with your help, I was able to swear to them that we have a good shot and that heaven is on our side. I know it didn’t seem like it, but the new you is a potent symbol. People were already whispering about you before you even made your appearance. The Four Winds are a very creaky ship indeed.”

  “Every single brother has had a fire lit under his ass by now,” Fang said. “The streets will be crawling with angry, desperate men.”

  “That’ll be true no matter what day we make our move. If they’re scattered, we’ll have an easier time taking the compound.” Birch twisted his hands together. “I know it’ll be a bloodbath. I’m hoping the Society can make our losses count. And…” He trailed off, chin drooping.

  “You’re probably right. If we wait, he’ll find out where I am eventually. He’d have the advantage of choosing when and where to attack. That would end in disaster even if he didn’t catch either of us.” Fang took a deep breath and admitted, “I wanted to protect you and prevent drastic action like this. When you sent that note saying you were planning to break me out, I knew it was too late for a quiet solution. My plans have all fallen through.”

  “Leave the planning to me, just like I leave the fighting to you,” Birch suggested. His smile, though slight, was there, and merely seeing it lifted Fang’s heavy heart.

  “When we’re done here, I’m going to break this curse and we’re not getting out of bed for a week.” The low growl of Fang’s last words made Birch jerk his head up and look around for anyone who might’ve overheard.

  “You’re gonna give me a heart attack,” Birch huffed.

  “Wait til you hear what I want to do to you.” Fang rested his chin in one hand and laughed noiselessly as Birch turned red.

  Fang spent a restless night in the shelter with Birch right beside him in a pallet dragged in from another curtained-off section of the floor. Though the lights were extinguished one by one, the stream of people coming for instructions only slowed, never stopping. Birch handled many himself, but after listening to the same answers over and over, Fang started giving directions to some of the Society members himself. It wasn’t enough to avoid waking Birch up for the entire night, though.

  The sleepless nights at headquarters had eroded Fang’s faith that he would become himself again. Now, he watched Birch and wished he could smooth that sleeping scowl. The best he could do was run the back of his hand down Birch’s blanketed spine.

  The blind girl’s words still rattled around Fang’s skull like thrown dice that hadn’t yet decided the gamble. She’d made love shattering stone sound like a bad thing, and Fang wasn’t as willing to dismiss her words as Orchid. After all, only he had endured the feeling of splitting apart. His dragon body breaking down put Birch at risk as well. A kiss that could crack open the tough outer shell of Fang’s dragon body would turn Birch into a human torch.

  But death setting Fang free sounded like a particularly terrifying style of religious talk that he didn’t want to contemplate. He had almost died in the warehouse fight simply because he’d tried to do the right thing and not kill a man. Mercy was a virtue, not a weakness, yet Fang had been punished for it with a wound that would have collapsed his lung and led to an ugly, agonizing death. Instead, he had spilled blood on Red Hand’s prize and received a gift he had neither asked for nor wanted.

  Fang wasn’t the type of man to reject a second chance. Birch was the best proof of that, a childhood friend whom Fang had taken as his lover. A second shot at living was a blessing from heaven. But the form it had taken was like a punishment itself. Without human frailty, there were no mortal pleasures, either. As long as he was a dragon, Fang would never enjoy another dream, another meal, or another night with Birch. The simple joy of human company was now fraught with fear. The dragon stone monks must have believed that this was a higher level of existence, but when Fang imagined spending the rest of his days in the same awful monotony, it stirred his soul to nausea.

  Birch shifted in his sleep and cracked a tremendous yawn. Fang withdrew, alert to the risk of accidental touching.

  “If we didn’t have to go,” Birch mumbled, “then I’d… If only you weren’t… forget it.” He yawned again and sat up. He threw off the blankets and rose. “It’s time to see what my preparations have gotten us. Keep the cloak, but you’re coming out with me.”

  “Is that so?” Fang looked up at Birch, who stretched carelessly. The weariness melted from him like wax in the sun. In no time at all, Birch seemed as fresh as a man coming off a feast and a full night's sleep. He extended a hand to Fang, who nearly accepted it. They both froze until Fang laughed. They left the safehouse together.

  Chapter 12

  Birch led Fang out into the streets and on a long, winding path through every Dockside slum and tenement. The sun was still low and climbing; the morning mists still clung to the city’s bones. A fine morning like this normally saw men and women already flocking out to their daily work, but the streets were quiet and many stands stood empty and unattended. Instead, they’d gathered at meeting points all throughout Dockside to collect weapons. The assembled peasants followed them.

  The few passersby trying to go about their daily routines seemed uncertain whether Fang or the mob of armed residents was worse. Some screamed when they saw Fang, but most simply moved aside and tried to disappear.

  The Rootless Society fighters joined in waves, blending in with the peasants and reinforcing them. The atmosphere took on a festival-like air as men and women chanted and waved homemade banners. Their excitement fed on itself, but Fang was immune. He knew that the mood would change quickly as soon as first blood was shed.

  Orchid joined them near Abalone’s. She gave Fang and Birch each a quick peck, then plunged into the crowd. Soon, the tallest men pushed to the front and formed a vanguard. Birch pulled Fang back and let the others surround him.

  “Are you ready?” Birch asked. He had to shout to be heard over the crowd.

  Fang simply nodded. A shout from him could have unexpected consequences. Something had been brewing in his chest all morning, like heartburn if dragons experienced such a thing.

  Something whistled past his snout almost faster than he could see it. Without thinking, he raised a clawed hand to swat it like a bug. A bolt bounced off his palm.

  While he stood in wonder that he had caught a crossbow bolt without even being scratched, Birch whipped around, looking toward the rooftops.

  “Assassin!” he bellowed.

  The crowd’s reaction rippled away from the word, some crying out, others dropping down or seeking the would-be killer.

  “There!” Orchid yelled, pointing back at the River Roses.

  The crossbowman had lingered a moment too long. Fang caught a glimpse of a rag-wrapped face. He knew that outline, that body language. “Wing.” She was still after him.

  “We don’t have time for this,” Birch growled. He grabbed two of the nearest, heartiest souls who hadn’t ducked when he’d yelled. “After her! The rest of you,” he looked around, “are you scared, or are you ready to end this?”

  The mob roared. Their thirst for blood only grew.

  Fang crushed the bolt in his fist. He’d soon face off against his old companions, men he’d betrayed in order to scatter the Four Winds like grains of sand. Wing was just a blowfly.

  Red Hand was surely waiting to punish his wayward son and set an example for anyone with thoughts of disobedience. Fang kn
ew that the old man had gathered all the rumors and sightings floating around Dockside to decide who would be punished and who would be killed. He had to know about Birch, Fang, and the origins of the Rootless Society by now.

  The gate of the Four Winds came into sight faster than Fang expected, yet the approach was almost slower than he could bear. The rickety wooden towers on either side of the gate were manned by brothers who shouted slurs at the crowd, but the words were absorbed by the assembled mob’s roar. The keyed-up mob’s energy shifted from celebratory to bloodthirsty within the space of a breath. Fang and Birch were forced apart by heavyset men bearing a huge section of a tree trunk fitted with wooden studs. This they used as a battering ram while the others bellowed, slowly pressing up against the compound’s walls.

  Red Hand had finally taken his subordinates’ advice and cemented shards of broken ceramics and glass on top of the wall, but that didn’t stop the Society. They’d come prepared. Women hurled blankets and rugs on the wall as the tallest fighters landed ladders. The very first two ladders were close enough to the guard towers that the brothers there pushed the ladders backward with poles, spilling the first climbers into the crowd.

  The answer to that was swift and fierce. Ropes and poles with hooks grabbed and tore at the Four Winds’ badly constructed towers and yanked them down. The brothers fell a long enough distance that escaping without broken bones at the very least was impossible. Other ladders found purchase, and with no one to repel them, the Society mob swarmed over the walls.

  Fang pushed through the crowd in search of Birch, but now many of the largest men had pushed their way to the fore. Birch would find Fang more easily than Fang would find Birch. Fang intended to protect him, but shielding someone was difficult when they were lost in a whirl of humanity.

  A tremendous crack interrupted that line of thought. Someone had flung lit fireworks over the walls. Shouts and cries of pain resounded in the brief silence; then the mob roared back louder than ever, as if they’d fed on that sign of weakness. A ragged volley of arrows arced over the walls and harvested screams, but it wasn’t the vicious retaliation Fang expected from his former compatriots.